Bad Influence
by PreppyRed
Summary: Castiel Novak is your average, studious junior at Pontiac High School, Illinois. Dean Winchester is the new student who catches his eye, not that he really wants to admit that to anyone.
1. Do You Like Him?

**Author's Note: So I saw the idea for this on tumblr some time ago, and I can't find the post that originally inspired me again, but I'd like to thank tumblr for being a wonderful source of inspiration. This will be updated every saturday, unless anything comes up. Onto the fic!**

~ Chapter One ~

At 6:30, the alarm clock started going off, playing the early morning radio full blast.

Castiel fumbled with the buttons of the clock, eventually finding the volume dial and turning it down before he got out of bed.

He rubbed the sleep from his eyes as he padded across the carpeted floor of his bedroom, pulling off his pajamas in the bathroom and turning on the shower faucet. It took a few moments for the water to heat up, but the momentary cold shower woke him up, and the warm water was very much welcomed as Castiel picked up the bottle of mint shampoo and dispensed a quarter-sized amount into the palm of his hand. The soap came next, with the same minty scent as the shampoo that alerted his senses every morning.

At 6:45, he stepped out of the shower, feeling awake and greatly refreshed; he pulled a blue towel off the bar nearest the shower and wrapped it around himself as he stepped out, padding across the carpet again towards the closet in his bedroom.

Hair dripping slightly, Castiel got dressed in something resembling his usual attire: a pair of dark-wash jeans and a white button-down shirt worn over a white undershirt. He dried his hair with the towel and shook his head a bit when he had returned to the bathroom and ran a comb through drying, dark hair. He scrubbed his face with a gentle soap and brushed his teeth before leaving the bathroom again, scooping up his sneakers from the closet on his way over to the bed.

At 7:00, he had his socks and shoes on, and alarm clock radio turned off just as the excitable hosts wished him a good morning, just like they did every morning.

At 7:05, he was pouring coffee into a to-go mug on the kitchen counter while an English muffin sat in the toaster. The muffin popped up, and Castiel fumbled with the hot pieces of bread for a few moments, forcing them onto a plate where he spread a thin layer of raspberry jam on both halves. He nibbled on the English muffin as he walked from the kitchen to the living room, gathering his backpack together on the living room coffee table before depositing it by the front door to be picked up on the way out. Having finished the first half of the muffin, he opened the closet by the front door, pulled his black blazer out unceremoniously and slipped it on.

At 7:15, Castiel was sitting in his car, his coffee mug in the cup-holder beside him, backpack in the passenger seat as he drove to school.

He pulled into the school parking lot ten minutes later, slipping his backpack across his shoulders and removing the mug from the cup-holder and sipping the now tepid coffee as he passed the parking spaces for the seniors. He looked forward to the day he would get to use those – they were so much more conveniently placed than the ones for juniors and the few underclassmen that could drive.

A gust of warm air greeted Castiel as he stepped inside Pontiac High School's south building and headed towards his locker. His locker was located almost completely on the opposite side of the campus from his group of friends, but he didn't mind so much, seeing as they were at school even earlier than him and met up around the bench nearest his locker or in center court of the campus. This morning was pretty nice, and the bench was empty, leading Castiel to assume that they had decided to gather under the oak tree in center court this morning instead.

He spun the dial of the locker expertly before it clicked and swung open, allowing him access to the few textbooks he would need before brunch. He disposed of his anatomy and English binders and books in the locker and traded them for a chemistry notebook and textbook as well as his history binder. Slamming the locker shut, Castiel spun on his heels and shrugged the backpack over his shoulders again, narrowly avoiding a collision with a guy in a leather jacket.

"Sorry, man." Leather-jacket mumbled, taking a few steps back.

"It was my fault." Castiel attempted to placate him for a few moments before realizing that he wasn't a familiar face, and he wore the well-known neon sticker under the fold of his jacket that distinguished him as a new kid. Someone had complained at the school for doing that a few years ago, Castiel recalled, but the administrators did nothing, only tried to mollify the student body by making the entire freshman class wear the stickers on the first day of school.

Leather-jacket's sticker had 'Dean' scrawled across it with a red sharpie.

"Welcome to Pontiac, Dean." Castiel greeted finally, giving Dean a warm, but not-too-warm smile. Being a new kid at the start of a new semester seemed like it would be pretty annoying, so showing him a little more kindness than necessary didn't feel too off.

But Dean stared back at him incredulously for a few long moments before snapping out of his reverie of some sort and responded: "Oh, thanks." Dean gave him a half-hearted smile it seemed, or a tired one, but it made his green eyes light up a certain way that held Castiel's attention.

"What's your name?" Dean asked coolly, taking a step closer to him, only to start spinning away at the dial of a locker.

"Castiel."

Dean gave him another one of those dubious looks, "You serious?"

"Why would I be joking about my name?"

"Oh, uh, no reason. S'just a mouthful." Dean looked slightly amused, even while he spun away at the dial, frequently looking from the combination on his hand to the lock before it finally clunked open.

"I suppose it is." Castiel couldn't bring himself to respond until Dean had thoroughly checked out his locker and shoved a few textbooks inside it. He scanned him up and down, taking in his worn jeans and boots, over-sized leather jacket and form-hugging black t-shirt beneath it. His hair had gel in it, and it stuck up in the front a bit, probably on purpose, but it looked a little sloppy, a little disheveled, but at the same time, completely intentional. His entire appearance seemed to exude this attitude, from the way he sort of slouched while he stood to the effortless way his green eyes called for the attention of the entire room – or maybe just Castiel's attention, he wasn't entirely sure anymore.

"Castiel!" A female voice jibed from behind him, and he turned halfway, watching as Dean nodded at him in what was probably a "see you later" motion and walk down the hallway, no backpack or books in sight. Odd.

It was Anna.

"Who's that?" She asked softly once Dean had turned a corner of the hallway and was out of earshot.

"Dean. He's new here."

"Oh." She nodded and glanced up at her friend, giving him an inquisitive look that he pretended not to notice as they walked towards center court in silence.

"So you just met him?" Anna queried once they were approaching the oak tree and their friends.

"Yes."

A slight pause.

"Do you like him or something?" She raised her eyebrows curiously and honestly at this question and Castiel found himself without an answer. He shook his head.


	2. Skipping Steps

~ Chapter Two ~

Anna's question was tailing him insistently.

Castiel had gotten through the rest of the week with the question on constant replay, followed by countless answers and justifications that didn't do anything for him. He still managed to stick to his routine though, believing that if he just tried to ignore what had disturbed his thoughts and peace of mind so greatly would stop doing just that. And when that happened, he assumed, he would be able to reconnect with his sanity… or whatever shreds of it he could find in the aftermath.

So when he awoke on Friday morning from a horribly sweet dream that featured the most haunting real set of elusive green eyes, Castiel panicked.

He didn't want to dream about Dean, he registered while in the shower, but it was the second time it had happened in two nights, and he wasn't exactly tired or bothered by it, to his surprise. It was just disconcerting how easily and quickly that this person had been able to infiltrate his every thought without even trying. But maybe that was just Dean's attitude – much like his highly intangible attitude towards school and almost anyone involved in it, he was a mystery himself.

A mystery, Castiel concluded with an air of annoyance, that he wanted to figure out.

/

The bell had already rung, shrill and loud when Dean sauntered into history class, unnoticed by the teacher, who was hunched over his laptop and the defective overhead projector that someone may or may not have put duct tape over the lens of, just to screw with the old guy. Not that he knew anything about that, but he'd heard a few kids he was sitting with at lunch talking about it, like they thought they were badass or something.

Dean slipped into a seat in the back corner of the classroom and plunked his textbook down on the desk as he slouched down into a comfortable position. The old guy managed to get the heading "World War One" across the screen and a thick black bar across the bottom where the duct tape was still stuck in place.

"This happens sometimes." A voice interrupted his bemused train of thought.

It was the kid with the locker next to his. The one with the blue eyes and carefully rumpled dark hair.

"Yeah?" Dean quirked back, letting the corner of his mouth twitch up in a half-smile at him.

The kid nodded around the same moment Dean noticed how he was wearing a blue sweater that matched the color of his eyes. Cute, he thought to himself for a fleeting second before mentally kicking himself in the ass. He'd promised himself he wasn't going to do that here, not again. People thinking he was a fag at the last school he was at was one of the reasons he'd been so eager to leave; even if he did know and totally understand that it was fine to be bi. Sam had given him that spiel one too many times already.

"Mr. Conway has been here for longer than the principal. He probably got his teaching job during World War One."

Dean raised an eyebrow at Blue-Eyes and grinned, chuckling a little and suddenly wishing he could remember the kid's name.

"I'd believe it."

They fell into comfortable silence once ol' Conway had yanked the duct tape off the projector's lens and started up the presentation, which was incidentally an introduction to the partner project they were going to do with the person seated beside them that required extensive research and a big, colorful poster. _Great._

It wasn't the fact that it was a partner project, that was going to be a giant pain in the ass, Dean supposed, it was just that it was a partner thing. A partner thing where he would probably have to try and not seem like a dumbass around his partner, who looked like a really studious kind of guy. What with his tidy and polite-but-not-too-polite way he held himself with, perfectly organized workspace and clothes – Dean was teetering between just going forth with his original judgment that Blue-Eyes was your average nerd and the admittedly kinder perspective that maybe he wouldn't be so bad.

"Dean?" Blue-Eyes again.

"What?"

"Your number, please." Well that was a little forward; he raised a curious eyebrow at Blue-Eyes.

The kid rolled his eyes, but he was smiling a bit too, like he noticed how awkwardly funny his accidental flirt had been. "For the project, I mean. So we can contact each other." He placed a half-sheet of binder paper on Dean's desk.

"Oh. Yeah, of course."

He wrote out his name and cell phone number as neatly as his hand would allow before trading slips of paper with… Castiel. Well no wonder he couldn't remember the name – he could barely spell it without sounding it out. He folded it in half and jammed it in his pocket, making a mental note to remember to bring his phone with him to school tomorrow.

/

It was the second time in three weeks that he'd gone to church alone.

This happened pretty frequently, seeing as Castiel's parents worked so much and awak from home more often than not. He hardly knew, or wanted to know anymore, what investments they were attending to when they were away from home. His mother had given up on trying to inform and explain it to him years ago. That was all well and fine with him, but he _did _have to wonder what it would be like to have them around all the time again.

When he was a child, they were both at home far more often. His father though, would have to go on business trips habitually while his mother would stay home and take care of a young Castiel. She was a kind, soft-spoken woman to say the least, but that might've been due to the amount of people who wanted to speak with and be around his father as much as possible. All the thralls of people tirelessly working to achieve his gratitude and affection overshadowed his mother, which he now realized was somewhat depressing, seeing as she had a lovable personality. As a child, he'd understood completely why there were so many company executives and workers that wanted to be in his presence. But the older he became, the less powerful, all-knowing and wonderful father appeared to be. Nonetheless, he was family, and Castiel would never admit all this to another living soul.

Castiel's mother had called earlier that morning, right around when his alarm clock was going off at 6:30, making sure that he was attending church, even though she and his father would not be joining him. Again.

Driving home, Castiel thought of how he had called Dean the evening prior, asking if he would be willing to get started on their project. Dean had agreed much quicker and readier than expected, but was just as quick and ready to inform him that the public library would be closed on a Sunday.

This entire string of events over the phone had occurred accordingly to Anna's plan. Anna had chosen not to believe Castiel when he told her that he did not possess romantic feelings for Dean and thus suggested, as casually as one could, that he invite Dean to the library. She had, of course, understood that the library was closed on Sundays and because of this, thought it absolutely brilliant of herself that Castiel should have to invite Dean over to his house to work on their project. She wholeheartedly convinced herself that the two boys being together alone would be good for the make-believe crushes they had on each other. She was ridiculous sometimes, but in a way that he found platonically endearing.

Dean had unknowingly skipped several steps in the process of already knowing about the public hours of the library, leading Castiel to invite him to come over sometime on Sunday afternoon – not that Castiel was _actually_ considering and following through with that half of Anna's plan. He wasn't.

Castiel was thinking and over-thinking the inane plan of Anna's wondering where she got off giving him relationship advice when she couldn't – or wouldn't, it was never very clear – keep a steady relationship for more than a few weeks. She claimed that she liked bouncing around between people like that because it was much more exciting than Castiel could ever possibly imagine. That was especially confusing to him – a longer-lasting relationship could be interesting too, he was sure of it, though he had no evidence of his own to battle against hers. He'd only ever gone on strings of dates that ended with mutual agreements to end the sequence right then and there. Furthermore, he wanted to believe that long-term relationships could be even more interesting than concise flings, since you could truly get to know someone and enjoy their company instead of forming a very breakable bond centered around lust and – "_Shit!_"

As he had grazed the corner nearest his house, readying himself and the car to turn into the driveway, he almost too late discovered that someone else had already parked there – he slammed down on the breaks.

/

Dean had just gotten out of the Impala at the address Castiel gave him yesterday over the phone. It was two-story house, with a manicured green lawn, swept porch and white painted walls that looked like a different color every time Dean blinked his eyes.

"Weird." He mumbled to himself as he strode over to the front door.

The door too, had the same pristine look and feel to it, with a gold knocker – he didn't even realize houses had those anymore. Motel rooms sure as hell didn't.

But after a few moments of unanswered silence by the pretty front door, Dean was beginning to wonder if Castiel had actually found a way to bail out on a study date thing at his own house. That would be taking rude to a whole new level, an impressive one, if that was actually the case, but still.

All thoughts of his project partner ditching evaporated into thin air at the screeching sound of tires out on the street – Dean spun around and practically hurled himself off the porch.

Stopped only _centimeters_ away from Baby, was a silver-blue car, some Volvo thing that he already hated with a burning passion because of how ugly it looked compared to the beauty that was his car, but now that it had almost hit _her_? Not okay. Definitely not okay.

"_What the hell?_" Dean was barking as he jogged up to the almost-wreck, realizing only too late that it was Castiel in the car, meaning that this was his house and – oops.


	3. If You Were Gay

~ Chapter Three ~

Dean was conflicted and distracted.

How his brain managed to have both going on at the once was beyond him entirely. Conflicted because Castiel had nearly totaled both of their cars, and maybe he shouldn't feel so angry about that since it was half his fault too, but how could he have known about that? And what was the gain in feeling guilty about something? That's right, it didn't exist.

And distracted? Well shit, Castiel had just come home from church and instead of changing out of his church clothes like a normal human being, he just ditched the coat, tie and dress shoes, so he sat around in dress-pants and a button-down white shirt. He'd left the top buttons undone too, making him that much more distracting.

Dean didn't really want to admit that he noticed stuff like this in Castiel all the time. He didn't. He really didn't. What he actually was doing though was catching himself staring at the kid or thinking about the too-blue eyes, fluffy and perpetual sex-hair and fully organized and proper appearance – at first he thought it was a stupid jealous sort of thing. Why wouldn't it be? Who wouldn't want to look so undeniably cute like him? No one. But the more he thought about it…

_No_. Not this time. He wasn't going to be called a fag again. It was a stupid name to call someone for some stupid thing they couldn't possibly fucking control. It was borderline immoral, if Dean actually decided to give a crap about that, which he honestly didn't. It was rude and wrong and yet those were the only justifiable words he could think of to use to describe it.

He opened up the history textbook and absent-mindedly turned to the index to look for some mention of French economy. Ugh, could they seriously be stuck with a more boring topic?

His mind wandered away from the ever-uninteresting subject to the last school he was at. It was in Mississippi, total ass-crack of the South in a damned tiny town in the middle of nowhere that was all at once, homophobic, racist, sexist – any kind of -ist that someone could be, that town was all over it. All that and then times ten for most businesses and the one school, at least. The homophobia was probably the worst though, and Dean hadn't figured that out until too late: there was this one senior guy that had been silently hitting on him, leaving ridiculously dirty messages in his locker and actually hitting on him whenever they ended up alone for a few moments, and damn, it was hot. So hot, in fact, that being pulled into a janitor's closet by the waist was fucking _exhilarating_. Well, at least until Mr. Senior had managed to get Dean's pants around his ankles and shirt off over his head just as the janitor walked in. He was pretty okay about the whole thing, only told them to clean up and get the hell out, God help them, and yet, word still got around and that was when the harassment began. And naturally, the entire damned school treated the big guy like he was the victim, since he was some hotshot, star athlete or something.

"Dean?"

He snapped back into reality at the sudden deep voice. "Huh?"

Castiel grinned a little at the falter in his voice for some reason; his blue eyes flickered between him and the book he'd been pouring over for who knows how long. It felt like they'd been here for a while.

"Do you need to take a break? We've been working on this for an hour and a half."

So it had been that long. "Please."

Castiel nodded and stood from his seat, stretching before walking into what Dean could only assume was the kitchen. From where he sat, he could see a white cabinet that looked like something that would only go in a kitchen. Most of the house was white, he realized with a certain curiosity. There were a few exceptions: the dining room table where they'd been, a few potted plants, the end tables on either side of the couch and the staircase. The staircase and tables were all made of glossy, unscathed mahogany, and the potted plants were, naturally, green. The white in here actually looked and felt like white though, not like the white paint outside the house that shifted tints and shades in his mind's eye with every blink.

/

Castiel had wordlessly excused himself from the table to look for something to eat in the kitchen. He was feeling slightly hungry, considering he'd eaten breakfast around seven this morning, per the norm, and it was now 1:30. He'd figured dean might be hungry too, or very bored, since Castiel had caught him fidgeting in his seat or spacing out more and more as the time ticked by.

The microwave went off and he cautiously pulled the steaming bag of popcorn out before dropping it on the counter. Crossing the kitchen to get a bowl large enough for the popcorn, Castiel witnessed Dean stretching in his seat – he was bent backwards over the back of the chair, arms above his head in such a way that it tugged upwards at his grey t-shirt and exposed his bellybutton and waistband of his boxers. Castiel looked away, a bright blush forming in his cheeks as he replayed the mental image once, twice, thrice in his head and fumbled with the bag of popcorn.

Why he suddenly felt so nauseous and anxious, but also irresistibly giddy all at once was understood a bit too clearly to him. He busied himself with emptying out the microwave-d back of popcorn into a red plastic bowl.

"You got a text." Dean murmured as Castiel placed the bowl and two water bottles in the middle of the table, across from both of them.

"Oh, thank you." He reached for his phone, which was right side up for Dean.

"I didn't mean to read it, I promise." Dean covered up before Castiel had a chance to ask; he nodded his understanding and unlocked the phone to Anna's most recent text message:

"_Hows the study DATE, Cassie? :3_"

Castiel cringed at the message, knowing that Dean had just read it and probably assumed that he had a raging, imbecilic crush on him.

"She loves joking around like this." Castiel attempted to say casually, but the burning in his cheeks and the sudden knot in his throat stopped it from coming out in anything resembling normal.

Dean nodded, his cheeks a little pink too. "Thought so."

Castiel sat down and dug his hand into the bowl of popcorn ate one rather tasteless kernel before trying to hide his discomfort by inspecting the three other pieces in his hand.

"It's uh, it's okay, ya know." Dean finally stuttered through a sentence, his hand slipping around the cap of a water bottle.

"What is?"

"What she said. Or, I guess, what she meant by it." He seemed to relax a little at having explained it, but he was still looking at Castiel with a certain level of quizzicality.

"I don't follow." He did, but he wanted to hear what Dean thought all this meant.

Dean shifted in his seat, took a sip of water and then responded: "I don't know, the way she used 'date' made it sound like you have a– or she thought you had a crush on, uh…" He trailed and licked his lips, unable to keep his green eyes focused on any one thing for more than two and a half seconds. Castiel was finding himself caught in the same habit, though he knew it to be fairly rude. "Okay what I meant to say, was that it's cool, if you're, you know–"

"Yes. I know." Castiel cut him off mid-sentence, feeling horribly sorry for him and guilty for asking the question to confirm what he had correctly assumed.

Dean sat there nodding for a few moments, licked his lips again, took a handful of popcorn and chewed it over slowly.

"Thank you though."

"Yeah." Dean looked seriously uncomfortable now which only served to add to Castiel's guilt.

"The same goes to you."

Their eyes caught in the middle, and though Castiel had stopped blushing minutes ago, he felt as if it was going to return at any moment. Dean's eyes shimmered with some indefinable emotion before he spoke again, in the same tone that made him sound very ill at ease.

"Dude, I'm not gay. That's not what I was getting at."

"That's fine. I meant if you were."

Dean's defensive tone of voice was hard to hear in a way that Castiel couldn't quite put a finger on. He would have quickly excused himself to the bathroom to respond to Anna, telling her how inappropriate her message had been, had it not been for the slight upturn of Dean's lips into a small, but sweet smile accompanied by the same redness on his cheeks as earlier.

Maybe he'd have to thank Anna for the little gift of that smile.


	4. Stuck in the Closet

~ Chapter Four ~

Mondays were always the most obstinately slow days of the week for Castiel, and probably most other people as well. But that had always served as a reason to work harder, just to endure the first day of the week, so that the rest of the days would be monumentally easier. He thought all this as he walked near the window of the second story of the north building to Japanese class. And who would think otherwise?

Castiel turned his head slightly and downward in such a way that he saw the figures of five teenagers exiting the school below. He only recognized one, thanks to the signature roughly treated leather jacket: Dean.

He stopped, clutching his textbook to his chest, mind racing to try and decipher what this meant, what Dean was doing leaving campus early. No good reasons came to mind, and the only thing Castiel was concerned about was the fact that Dean had promised they would work on the project again today, seeing as they had collected all the necessary information on Sunday and now they just needed to put it on a poster. A poster that Dean had also promised to provide for this purpose, seeing as he would be doing most of the assembling.

"You're feeling sick, Castiel?" The sharp, accented voice of his Japanese teacher asked, concern shimmering in her dark eyes.

"Yes. Would you allow me to go to the office?"

She nodded and gave him a light, worried smile. "Feel better."

"Thank you."

He turned on his heels, walking out of the classroom slowly, holding his stomach a bit to fake the sickness and hopefully make it believable. He passed Anna and Balthazar on his way out, who shot him twin confused looks that worsened when he shot back a nod; he would tell them what this was about later, but for now, there were more important things at hand.

He broke into a jog as he exited the buiding, scanning across the main lawn for Dean and his unsavory companions. They hadn't gotten very far, as they just seemed to be sauntering across the grass off campus, in no hurry or showing any signs of concern for the fact that they were leaving campus during school hours. Didn't they have any ethics? Didn't _he_ have any ethics? He was following them, Dean specifically but still.

Clutching his Japanese textbook to his chest as he jogged across the lawn, he sent a wordless, silent prayer that he wouldn't be caught doing this, and that if so, forgiven readily.

"Dean!" He called out once he noticed that Dean was starting to lag behind the group and he was positive that he would be in earshot.

Dean turned around quickly, a bewildered look settling across his delicate features; he stopped and waited for Castiel to catch up, though he glanced back at his group of friends who hadn't really slowed down or stopped for him. Odd.

"What the hell are you doing here?"

"That's funny, Dean, I was going to inquire the same thing."

Dean looked at him with an expression of sheer disbelief for a few moments before he practically spat, "What?"

"Why are you ditching class?"

Dean's eyes burned with anger in the same way that his cheeks looked to be burning with embarrassment. Castiel didn't feel the same blush in his presence for once, only confusion as to why Dean would do such a thing and why– why was he trying to stop him from doing this? They didn't have any kind of friendship or close relations at all outside the nearly finished history project, so why was he _wasting_ his time?

Dean opened his mouth to speak, but one person from his group shouted back that they saw a teacher coming.

_Good_, Castiel thought with a tone of unhindered arrogance, they would get in trouble for ditching class and –

"Dude, _come on!_" Dean had grabbed him by the arm and was running back towards the school building, practically dragging Castiel along as he disgracefully realized that he was guilty of this same crime, but he picked up his pace and caught up with Dean. He shifted the textbook into one hand as he ran, glimpsing behind him quickly every few seconds to see if those kids were right and there really was an administrator on their heels.

"C'mere!" Dean commanded again before Castiel could witness any such person and was grabbed by the arm again and pulled around a corner into the side-door of the east building.

Dean slowed down a bit now as they entered the building and pressed against the wall beside a janitor's closet – what were they doing here?

Castiel watched with what surely was the most appalled facial expression he could make as Dean knelt down and picked the lock with a bobby pin he pulled from seemingly no where. But before he could ask where Dean had found the pin and how he had learned to do that, he was being yanked by the arm _again_, into the closet.

He stumbled in after Dean's previously unheard of strength, his foot catching on the side of a trash bin as he fell into Dean, whose foot bashed into the door, letting it slam shut with an audible click.

Dean grunted after a moment of being pressed into the floor, and Castiel could honestly say he felt sick to his stomach now. Their noses brushed as Castiel sat up, sending a bolt of lightning through his veins as he got onto his feet and stood. He offered a hand to Dean who still lay on the ground, his breath knocked out of him.

Dean took the hand and stood slowly, regaining his balance against a shelf full of cleaning products. His breathing was heavy, like panting, though Castiel could hardly breathe at all. He felt as though they air had been sucked out of his lungs and replaced with tar so he couldn't breathe, couldn't speak.

/

"No, no, no!" Dean whined as he jiggled the handle of the closet door; it was locked. Or stuck. Whichever it was it was ridiculous that the stupid closet was locked from the outside in, and not the other way around. What was the point in that? So those pesky bottles of Windex didn't escape?

"Is it locked?" Cas' tone sounded unrealistically calm, but if Dean heard right, there was a twinge of some other emotion in there that made his voice catch in his throat.

"Yeah." Dean kicked the hinges of the door, hoping that might make it give – nothing. He scanned the darkened floor several times, looking for the bobby pin that he must have dropped on the way in. It could also have easily gone skittering through the space beneath the door when they shoved themselves into the closet. He internally cringed at the way that sounded, his mind soon wandering over to the brush of their noses when Castiel had landed, quite literally, on top of him. Wasn't that just perfect; he turned his head away from where Castiel stood, giving him one of those signature head-tilts and confused faces, trying to hide the blush that was forming in his cheeks. _Fuck_, could he be acting any gayer for today?

The bright, blue light of a cell phone distracted him though, and Dean whipped his head around to see that Castiel was typing into it.

"What're you doing _now_?" He resisted the urge to snap at him entirely, though his tone was rough with ice that he didn't bother apologizing for. It was, in a way, Castiel's fault that they were stuck in the tiny janitor's closet, brushing arms every time they moved.

"Getting help." Well at least he was just as snippy in return. Dean could respect that.

"From who?" His volume and tone rose sharply with this one and Dean swore he could see him roll his eyes; it was a lot like something Sammy would do. Huh.

"From my friends, don't worry. And it's 'whom'."

"What?"

"The correct way of saying that phrase is 'from _whom_', not 'from who'–"

"Oh shut up." Dean cut him off, punching him in the arm with a little more force than intended. If it had been anyone else Castiel corrected, Dean might've laughed or been at least remotely amused.

He glanced down at Cas' bright cell phone screen; he had just finished typing out the message:

"_Dean and I are stuck in a closet_."

It was only a few moments before Anna's response came.

"_Thats what ive been telling you. Whats your point?_"

"What the fuck?" Dean muttered under his breath, swallowing hard and glancing up at Castiel, whose cheeks were taking on a rosy glow of their own.

"She, uh, she thinks we–"

"Yeah, yeah, I get it, just, um, explain to her."

_Slow down there, speed stutter-er_, Dean attempted to coax his tongue into a calmer place while Castiel feverishly typed:

"_No, we're actually locked in the janitor's closet in the east building._"

She was quick to respond.

"_Do i want to know why youre in there?_"

"_There was a situation_."

Dean groaned, and Cas tilted his head at him again.

"_Its a gay thing, isnt it?_"

"_This has nothing to do with homosexuality, Anna_."

Dean had to restrain a cackle at Castiel's response – that was adorably awkward, and _no_, he did not just call a dude adorable.

Anna didn't reply for a few moments.

"_Is this closet small? ;)_"

"_Are you coming to get us or not?_"

"_Yea, hold your horses. School lets out in five mins. We'll get you out in ten._"

"_Thank you._"

"_Try to get frisky while you wait, k? ;)_"

Castiel let out a sight that sounded both exasperated and amused all at once. Dean found himself enjoying the little quirk of a smile at the edges of Cas' full lips, the certain sparkle of blue in his eyes that made him both ashamed and giddy. Shit, was he even going to try to keep the gay at bay anymore?

"Does she always do that?" Dean asked, when the silence had grown noticeably uncomfortable.

"Not always. She believes that we should be romantically involved though, which is why she behaves so strangely."

Dean found himself cringing internally again at the term "romantically involved". Could he have picked a more awkward two words?

"Are you alright?" Castiel asked, cuing Dean into the fact that his cringe wasn't as internal as he thought it was.

"Yeah, just kinda weirded out."

"By Anna?"

Dean nodded. "How is it any of her business what we, I mean you, choose to do with your free time?"

"It isn't any of her business, but she and I have been friends since grade school, so she thinks she knows what's best for me." His stare was cool and unperturbed, though Dean couldn't look at him for more than a few moments.

"And she thinks _I'm_ what's best for you?" He shook his head and let out a soft chuckle, leaning against the bare wall of the closet.

"Why is that surprising to you?" Those same blue eyes were now glittering with anticipation and curiosity, the adorable bastard.

"Cos' I'm not a _good_ guy. I'm not trying to be, anyways, and you deserve someone better."

Cas looked almost offended at this, but before either of them could react to Dean's brutal honesty, the school's shrill bell rang and Dean sighed with relief. Only five more minutes to go.

"Dean, you are good." Castiel finally interjected, looking sorely affronted.

"I'm really not, man. And it'd be great if you could let that go." He made sure to make his voice sound as warning as possible, though he was trapped between wanting to know where and why Castiel was getting this idea and wanting to hug him for it; he didn't act on either notion.

"Then you can deal with my belief that you _are_ a good person." His tone was sharp and rough all the way through, and it almost made Dean flinch back into the wall. He just wanted to get out of here, like he had in what felt like hours ago.

Those guys probably ran off the opposite direction and had managed to get off campus and were probably laughing at him now, thinking about how some weird, nerdy kid had tried to stop him from ditching. That would be _fantastic_ to explain later.

Two knocks at the door interrupted his train of thought and Dean jumped to his feet, ignoring the surprised look on Cas' face.

"Guys?" A girl's voice pervaded the air around them and Castiel nodded at Dean, which gave him the strangest sense of assuredness.

"Yes, Anna, we're in here."

The door clicked as it opened, but it only opened about a quarter of the way, and Dean shoved himself into Cas' personal space, craning to see what the hell was going on.

"Not yet." Anna teased, raising an eyebrow at him as she stood, arms folded a few feet away from the door.

"No, you let us out now!" Dean barked, slamming his hand against the door that didn't budge.

"Balthazar's got the door, you're not getting out just yet." A playful smile turned up the corners of her thin lips and Dean fought back the urge to snarl at her.

/

"What do you want?" Castiel pleaded, failing at ignoring the searing heat at the back of his neck that was Dean's breath.

Anna smirked and glanced over at Balthazar on the opposite side of the door. "A kiss."

"_What?_" Dean barked again, slamming his hand against the closet door once more, but it gave slightly this time, a probably shocked Balthazar still holding it shut; he was stronger than most people other than the lacrosse team gave him credit for.

"We're not going to let you out until you kiss, and it's not up for debate!" Anna looked positively giddy at her terms, though they made Castiel's stomach turn in circles and perform an intense gymnastics routine within the confines of his body.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Dean demanded, causing the heat on the back of Castiel's neck to deepen and send goose-bumps down his spine.

"Nope!"

Castiel glanced back at Dean, whose expression changed from furious and livid beyond all help to a painfully defeated one, though his green eyes still shimmered with resentment.

"I'm waiting!" Anna drawled, though Castiel didn't get a chance to look over at her – Dean's lips were pressed against his, forceful and just as hot as the breath on his neck for only a moment before he pulled back.

"Are you happy now?" Dean challenged, his previously furious voice having softened a bit.

"I am, but Balthazar missed it." She was smirking again, and Castiel's stomach was back to doing flips in every direction possible while the rest of his body was in a state of shock. The door opened fully, and Balthazar steppe around it, a weak smile playing at his lips as he looked them both in the eye and shrugged.

"Fuck you both." Dean grumbled, giving them both the finger as he tangled his free hand in Castiel's hair and forced him into another bruising, fiery kiss. The sudden intensive pull that Dean gave him sent Castiel stumbling into Dean again, hands braced to push off against his chest before they got too close.

Dean broke the kiss again and practically shoved Anna out of the way as he went past her, heaving the side door of the building open as he stormed off.

Castiel found himself adopting a similar method, but it was towards his locker.

"Cassie, wait!" Anna's voice called out from behind him, accompanied by hurrying footsteps.

"No!" He snapped back at them, breaking into a run and not stopping until he reached his locker. The campus was almost entirely empty by now, especially in the hallway where his and Dean's lockers were, and the sound of Castiel fumbling with the dial of his locker was fully audible.

"There you are!" Balthazar's voice echoed down the hallway along with two sets of footsteps and Castiel groaned aloud, wishing that he could crawl up into his locker and hide there until they went away. He settled for taking out the books he needed and leaving the ones he didn't. He wanted to be angry with them, he did, but something about kissing Dean Winchester was making him feel very confused.

"Why'd you run off?" It was Anna now.

"Because I didn't want to talk to either of you. I still don't."

He could almost _feel_ Anna's amusement seeping through the locker door. "Aw, why? Because we made you kiss Dean?" She mock-soothed in a way that infuriated Castiel.

"Yes." He snapped, slamming the locker shut and glaring at her. "Now leave me alone."


	5. Antonio and Bassanio

**Author's Note: Has anyone else realized that this friendship between Anna, Balthazar, Castiel and Dean can be shortened to ABCD? I realized that today and cackled for a very long time. :D**

~ Chapter Five ~

The rest of the week passed by quickly and though Castiel did eventually forgive Anna and Balthazar for their act of disloyalty, they were more watchful of where they stepped around him, as well as what they said. He supposed it served them right, because making him kiss Dean under those ridiculous circumstances was both uncomfortable and not at all how he had hoped it would happen if were going to at all, _and_ it had caused Dean to stop talking to them outside of project research and piecing together their poster. They had turned in the project on Thursday afternoon and Dean had only murmured something about them doing a good job, to which Castiel murmured his agreement before they handed it in.

Now that the project was over, Castiel thought, they truly did not have any reason to speak with one another. That was the basis of his new motivation to avoid speaking to Dean Winchester as much as he could, and Dean, in his own incredible ways, seemed to be doing something vaguely similar: they would pass each other in the hallway or brush shoulders when one of them went to their lockers, but Dean would pretend he hadn't noticed.

It was Friday after school now, and Castiel was in the middle of depositing and withdrawing books from his locker for the weekend when Anna bounced up to his locker and drummed on the open door of his locker.

"Yes, Anna?" He shut the locker, giving her as annoyed a look as he possibly could. She didn't seem to notice.

"Are you going to Gabriel's party tonight?" She looked positively giddy, and Castiel couldn't help but smile at her happiness; it was contagious, especially when he didn't want it to be.

"I hadn't planned on it." He shouldered his backpack and began walking towards the parking lot.

"No?" She bounced along, her red hair tied in a high ponytail. "I thought it would be fun."

Castiel shrugged, not making eye contact with Anna.

"And I heard Dean was going to be there." She drawled out a few of her words, probably trying to coax him into coming. Instead, all that she accomplished was making him remember the strong press of hot, dry lips against his; he shook his head.

"I would rather not go, thank you."

Anna looked slightly defeated at this, but there was still a soft shimmer of hope in her eyes. "Want me to tell him you said hi?"

Castiel shrugged again as they neared the parking lot. "If that is what you wish."

She grinned and said her goodbyes before bouncing away over to her own car. It was a relief in the worst sense of the word to have her gone though; he was sick and tired of thinking about Dean like this, and every time she was around, it happened.

Getting home, there was a lot of traffic, and a bountiful amount of time that Castiel spent wondering if he should go to the party tonight. He'd only gone to one of those parties this year, though they seemed to happen every week or so, and the one excursion had ended up with him having half a drink and having to drive Anna and Balthazar to their respective homes in their intoxicated states. He hadn't particularly enjoyed the experience of being surrounded by so many of his drunken peers, but watching Anna and Balthazar fall under the influence was admittedly very entertaining. They were normally just as studious as he was, the exception being Anna on the weekends, when she liked to have her little flings and fun that Castiel would occasionally find himself disagreeing with. He only hoped now, as he drove home, that there would be someone to get them home safely if they chose to imbibe copious amounts of alcohol.

He got home about half an hour later than expected, though that wasn't a problem, as he wasn't really planning on doing anything in particular this evening. His parents weren't home this evening, though they had promised to be home for the weekend, or at least his mother would be, if his father couldn't make it out. So after leaving his backpack by his desk in his bedroom, Castiel went back downstairs to tidy up the space. If there was one thing that his mother was known for it was keeping a clean home, and he didn't want to take that away from her.

He vacuumed the entire downstairs floor and swept the stairs all in under 45 minutes, meaning it was now only 4:40; he moved into the kitchen, to unload and load the dishwasher, put away clean kitchenware and scrub away the grime that was stuck to the dishes he had used last night before moving to do some laundry upstairs. The only clothes to wash were his own, so it proved to be a rather small few loads of clothing that were easily sorted and put into the washing machine while the dishwasher was still going.

Castiel went back upstairs feeling satisfied that his mother wouldn't be terribly annoyed with the overall state of the house when she returned. He sat down with a displeased moan as he unpacked the contents of his backpack in order to get a head start on it for the weekend. Sundays were best spent resting, in his opinion, not working tirelessly over an English paper.

Math problems came first though, and after half an hour of sketching hyperbolas and ellipses, Castiel was finished and ready to move onto Japanese. Japanese was finished within a similar time frame, the majority of Japanese homework ever being translating the characters into English or Japanese and practicing the Japanese alphabets, since there were two of them: a new one and a traditional one. He had pulled out his English homework next, which was to read the first act of The Merchant of Venice, a Shakespeare novel that he had read over many times before, but was absolutely delighted to be reading it again, even if it was in the capacity of schoolwork.

The washing machine started beeping however, indicating that it was finished with washing his whites and he would need to move them to the dryer now. He did so efficiently, transferring the soggy clothing to the dryer and starting a new load of blues and greens. His stomach growled as he padded down the hallway back to his room, and with one quick glance at the alarm clock, he saw that it was 7:45: dinnertime.

There was little to eat left in the fridge other than one serving of leftover spaghetti, so Castiel pulled it out of the fridge and removed the Tupperware lid as he glided over to the microwave and started it up. He emptied the dishwasher once more while waiting for his dinner to warm up, and was just closing its door when the microwave started beeping at him.

He didn't bother to move into the dining room to eat his dinner, instead choosing to hop up on the counter and sit there while chewing on mouthfuls of pasta. It wasn't very good anymore; the tomato sauce having gotten dry and sticky on the noodles while the noodles were greasy with the oil that had dripped out of the sauce. He managed to swallow it all down in about five minutes and wondered bleakly while washing the container if he would be having a better evening if he were at the party right now with Anna and Balthazar.

It couldn't have hurt to go, Castiel realized with a certain sense of dissatisfaction, that he could have had a good time, even if he didn't partake in the drinking of alcohol and the dancing and… okay, maybe not. Maybe a night in would be a better use of his time. He wasn't a good dancer, and anyone who had seen him dance before could honestly agree with him; he was okay with that. He had long since gotten over the embarrassment that was his attempts at looking cool while dancing. It just never worked out. But still, it would've been interesting to have a night out with his friends, like he so rarely did, even without the dancing and alcohol. He only wished that they would be offered something else to do once in a while rather than one of Gabriel's famous parties. He had met Gabriel a handful of times, since they were in the same ceramics class one year, and Gabriel had the most profound ability to make grotesquely interesting works of art out of the slabs of clay and bottles of glaze they were given. Castiel was never sure whether he should commend Gabriel for these abilities or ignore them entirely, but the rest of the school seemed to think he was a fun person to be around, so he must not be very harmful.

He was a rather typical senior, Castiel had concluded that evening while pouring over Act One of his Shakespeare. The thought had popped into his head at random, in the midst of grinning over the undeniably romantic connection between Bassanio and Antonio, though it was a controversial topic of conversation in the Shakespearian community. Solario and Solanio also appeared in the current scene he was reading, and somehow their combined natures made Castiel think of Gabriel. It was a particularly strange realization, he thought as he sat back in his desk chair, that one real person could somehow seem like the combination of two fake ones.

Though he wasn't given very much time to dwell on this before his doorbell rang and Castiel stood up from his chair, jogging down the stairs as fast as his legs would skillfully allow him. He had no good idea of who it could be: it was only nine o'clock now, which was pretty early for Anna or Balthazar to be knocking on his door drunk and needing to spend the night, or something of a similar nature, and even earlier for his parents to be home, since they had promised to be home by noon on Saturday, tomorrow. He peered through the peephole on the front door – was that who he thought it was?

Opening the door confirmed his suspicions: Dean Winchester.

"Hey, Cas." Dean drawled lazily, his arm against the frame of the door, holding himself up. And where did that nickname come from? Castiel hadn't realized that they had reached a nickname basis of friendship, or whatever it was that they had between them.

"Hello, Dean. Are you alright?"

Dean let himself in, shut the door behind him and was now leaning against it, shaking his head. His movements were sloppy, uncomfortable and matched those of –

"Are you drunk?"

Dean giggled and took one more step straight into Castiel, the stubble on his chin brushing against the side of Castiel's face. Castiel opened and closed his mouth, looking for words that wouldn't come as Dean wrapped his arms around his waist. Chills ran up and down his spine centering around Dean's warm touch.

"Dean, I think you should stop this."

Friends didn't do this, no one did this; Dean was far too drunk and the way he was breathing practically into Castiel, alcohol on his breath that eluded the same intense warmth, the same _fire_ that made his train of thoughts snap off to that of those kisses. His head started spinning, his heart was beating far too quickly and he suddenly felt sick, like he'd just gotten off a roller coaster and his dinner wasn't holding down very well.

"Why?" His voice was clear, tone more concise than Castiel had ever heard as he pulled away, arms still wrapped around his waist; it all bleakly reminded him of the too warm, too dry kisses.

"This," Castiel tapped his hands against Dean's shoulders for a moment, desperately trying to pull away again, screaming internally. "this isn't you. You don't – we don't do this."

Dean's face was incomprehensible, his green eyes shimmering with that same blank light as Castiel struggled to keep his face composed and calm. What was going on within the confines of Dean's head was a complete mystery shrouded by green haze. He opened his mouth to speak only to feel the sudden heat of Dean's lips and tongue sliding over his.

_Crap_.

/

The drunk brain had taken over so quickly: it had driven him, somehow, in one piece to Cas' house, knocked on his door and let himself in without actually hearing Cas let him in. The drunk brain had caused him to basically crumble into this guy he _really_ didn't know that well and invade his personal space so ridiculously much that his sober, straight brain was sobbing, drowning in booze from earlier that night and gay_, so much gay_. Oh well.

All he could think about though, was the rush of adrenaline he'd felt when he was forced to kiss Cas. He thought he hated it at the time, and may very well have, but he wasn't going to deny the butterflies that he had been feeling too. He hated butterflies though, they were a girly way of describing anxiety and Dean _motherfucking_ Winchester was manly as _fuck_, but they came around whenever he got too close to Cas – the son of a bitch was _damn_ attractive.

The drunk brain had taken full control, and wasn't that just great? It might've been okay if he'd been alone, but here he was, trying to remain in Castiel's arms and kissing him with more heat and tongue than he had yet to give any hot girl at the school, and there were quite a few. But that concern of his was apparently lost on or totally unimportant to his drunken inner self who happened to be horribly and flamboyantly gay and wanted to keep rutting against Cas like this and probably get into his pants while he was at it. Sober Dean was locked in a cage right now or handcuffed to something and tied to another something that – _fuck_, what was he _doing_?

Drunk Dean, who had managed to take control of his limbs and basically all other organs besides the brain, which was Sober Dean's stalwart fucking cage. But even he was getting lost in the tremors of exultance that centered around the slow, unsure way Cas kissed him back, gently slid his tongue over Dean's, nipped down on his lower lip with a certain gentleness that he might've appreciated had he not been entirely drunk and uh, _not gay_.

These thoughts didn't slow down Drunk Dean though, because he was practically shoving his tongue down Cas' throat, seeing how far he could get his tongue in before he hit tonsils or something, the back of a throat, an esophagus, whatever. Sober Dean couldn't decide which was more appalling: the fact that here he was, finding himself strangely enjoying the feeling of his tongue halfway down Cas' _throat_, or the fact that Cas, this goody-two-shoes, straight-A student who wore button-down shirts and blazers on a _daily basis_, was kissing him back with more expertise, nimbly getting his tongue tangled with Dean's.

Sober Dean blacked out for a few moments, resurfacing seconds that could have easily been many minutes later on a couch in the living room? He wasn't sure but they'd migrated somehow without his notice. _Good going, Drunk Dean_.

They were still making out somehow, and it seemed to both Deans that the longer he was kissed, the more Cas loosened up, the harder he kissed back and the more he allowed Dean to keep rutting into him through kisses. They were still standing, Cas now with one arm wrapped around Dean's waist and the other twisting into his hair while Dean either tugged at the belt-loops of Cas' pants or ran his hands up and down the guy's chest; he wasn't sure what he was more surprised about – the fact that he was doing this, or the fact that Cas was _letting_ him do this. Castiel had his back to the white couch and Dean kept backing him up until his knees hit the seat of the couch and buckled underneath him so that he was sitting down, legs spread out a little more than necessary, the collar of his shirt tugged only slightly out of place, lust-blown blue eyes and full, pink, kiss-swollen lips only slightly parted. He heard himself let out a pleased chuckle or maybe a moan, he couldn't tell. All he knew was that he was suddenly on top of Cas, kissing him again. One of them let out another groan, and Dean couldn't find it either his drunk or sober selves to care who had done it. He was so hopelessly lost in the slide of their lips before kissing a sloppy line along Cas' jaw, up and down his neck, nipping and sucking at a certain spot below his ear that caused Cas to make the most delicious whimpers, moans and gasps for breath – oh, _fuck_.

His fingers ineptly fumbled with the buttons of Cas' shirt, trying desperately to get the damn things undone before finally getting it and all of them popping out of place in quick succession. Castiel's chest was _finally_ bare and completely exposed, heaving with every breath, even as he stretched his neck upwards to allow full access to his neck. Dean resumed sloppily kissing and sucking up and down his neck and collarbones while clumsily running his fingers over his uncovered nipples, pinching and trying to flick here and there to elicit as many of those fantastic, erratic whimpers.

Dean shifted forward, thrusting his hips into Cas, nearly collapsing into him at the violent waves of pleasure that centered around Cas' clearly sensitive groin. Dean thrust into him again, and again, and again, and _again, again, again,_ groaning into Cas' neck who was making similar noises. It all felt too good, _stupid good_; it overwhelmed his drunk brain and his fucking _dick_.

/

Castiel wasn't sure how he did it, but he somehow managed to get Dean's drunk, limp body up the stairs to his bedroom by stringing his arm under Dean's and placing Dean's over his shoulders as he clasped his waist and basically half-dragged, half-carried him up the stairs, since he wasn't being very compliant. Though it did appear that he was awake, because he clung to Castiel's neck once he was finally dropped onto the bed, mumbling something, though the only intelligible word he could make out was 'stay'. He promised Dean he would come back, which seemed to satisfy him at least a little, and he settled down into the covers of the bed. He had either God or lots of lacrosse conditioning to thank for the strength he needed to carry Dean.

Now in the bathroom, Castiel was faced with the irritating conquest of fixing his erection, never mind how strange that phrase sounded He knew Dean had been able to get off while they were doing whatever it was that just happened downstairs – it was obvious to him at least– though Castiel hadn't and now it wasn't anywhere near going down; it was getting painful, to be perfectly honest. The longer he left it untouched in his pajama pants, the more his attention seemed to be drawn to the nagging pain. And if he was going to be spending the entire night in the same room as Dean? Okay, maybe this needed to be handled.

Castiel padded over to the toilet and put the cover down before sitting and lowering his pajama pants to his knees. He didn't do this at all really, never seeing a reason to do so, but started with slow rhythmic strokes anyways. Playing over the events of the evening with Dean helped more than Castiel could have ever imagined, and fairly soon thereafter, his strokes had morphed into erratic tugs and twists. He bit down on his bottom lip, attempting to contain the heightening moans that surely would've escaped his mouth otherwise, had it not been for the real Dean being asleep on his bed in the room over.

Feeling satisfied, if not a small portion uncomfortable with what he essentially just had to do, Castiel tiptoed over to his closet where he successfully pulled out his old sleeping bag from tall shelf. Arraying it on the ground beside his bed quietly wasn't the difficult part so much as trying to fall asleep with his heart still thudding in his chest from the evening's events and Dean's sweet scent intoxicating him from his bed, only two and a half feet away. Some way or another though, he did manage to fall asleep and have a fortunately dreamless night.


	6. Mother Dearest

~ Chapter Six ~

Sunlight was streaming through the window in thin panels, casting across Castiel's entire bedroom. He stretched a bit, feeling sore, but somehow more rested than he had in a long while. His hand hit the baseboard along the wall as he stretched though, and his brain supplied a helpful replay of what happened last night. His mind swarmed and thoughts of how inappropriately wonderful last night was became unavoidable, scurrying about every inch of his mental capacity as he sat up. He was half-surprised and half-relieved to see Dean still lying in his bed where he had some how managed to get the taller teenager last night. Castiel had figured he would leave sometime in the middle of the night, but remembering how drunken Dean had truly proven himself to be helped him realize how unlikely that theory was. And besides, lying on top of Castiel's white bed sheets, fully clothed and oddly peaceful looking, Dean seemed content, and that stirred something unfamiliarly warm within him.

Turning his head, Castiel could easily see his alarm clock, its bright numbers telling him that it was currently 11:42 AM. He'd slept far longer than he would have on a normal weekend, and had it been a normal weekend, he thought, he might've gotten out of bed two or three hours ago, gone for a run, made some tea, taken a shower and he would have leisurely gotten ready to see his mother. _Oh no_.

He threw himself out of the sleeping bag, wadding it under his arm before chucking it into the closet, trying not to worry about the thump noise that followed it hitting the floor; something must have fallen from a shelf. He would fix it all later, he would have to; practically ripping off his pajama pants, Castiel stumbled around the room before trying ineptly to pull on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. The shirt went on with considerably less difficulty than the pants, since the legs had gotten tangled around themselves in his ridiculous hurry, causing him to nearly fall into a nearby dresser, which surely would've sent all of its contents flying and skittering just about everywhere he could possibly imagine.

He ran into the bathroom, sliding with feet still in socks from yesterday in such a way that he almost rammed straight into the bathroom counter. With his unbelievable luck this morning, Castiel was shocked he managed to avoid that fate. He brushed his teeth and hair, scrutinizing his worried expression in the mirror, bright blue eyes with small darkened rings beneath his eyes, stubble showing itself on his chin and along his jaw and a pale complexion flawed by dark, round blotches on his neck and peeking out over the collar of his shirt. He groaned, an instant replay being provided by his brain's annoying generosity as he wondered how on earth he was going to be able to hide them from anyone, let alone his too-attentive mother.

Not a single solution came to mind other than the concept of wearing a large, fluffy scarf, but that would surely seem suspicious and unusual, and would likely feel the same way.

"Castiel?" His mother's voice rung out from downstairs – he jumped.

"Yes?" He called back, scrambling to get out of the bathroom.

"Please come downstairs," She called once more before the sound of heeled shoes clicking across hardwood sounded.

Dean was just beginning to stir as Castiel made his way to the bedroom door and he stopped, watching as those green eyes opened slowly, blinking often, most likely trying to get used to the unfamiliar light and setting.

Castiel didn't waste any time with the questions and confusion he knew Dean would possess for him once he gained his bearings. "Don't move." He commanded, one fist clenching at his side.

Dean shook his head.

"Don't worry." He mumbled before shoving his face back down in the pillow with a displeased groan.

Castiel nodded now and stepped out into the hallway, shutting the door softly behind him and jogging down the stairs. His mother stood in the kitchen, her black coat most likely abandoned by the front door, though she was still in her professional outfit of a prudently long, black pencil skirt, white button-down shirt and sensible but high-heeled shoes. It was uncommon to see her in clothes other than these, the ones she worked in most of the time.

"Hello, Castiel." Her voice was soft but warm, easily matching her subdued appearance.

"Hello." He murmured in return, smiling back at her and clasping his hands behind his back as he came to stand beside her in the kitchen, where she was already preparing two cups of tea.

They didn't speak for a while, meaning she made the cups of tea, her nimble hands pouring hot water into the cups and placing familiar bags of tea in each cup. Meanwhile, Castiel stood watching her perform these simple steps, observing her seemingly fragile, but capable but hands, sleeves neatly folded over her wrists to fit properly, collar of her shirt trimly folded, dark blonde hair held precisely at the nape of her neck in a tidy bun. All this, though tediously neat, seemed very soft and understated to Castiel, as did the majority of her appearance. By societal standards, she was nothing spectacular to look at, blonde hair and fair skin an expected pair, though striking mint green eyes deemed her curiously abnormal yet endearing to some. Curiously abnormal yet endearing seemed to be an appropriate set of words to describe his mother, Castiel thought, seeing as most people would either agree or not take notice of her.

Her appearance, he found himself thinking, was nothing similar at all, whatsoever, to Castiel's. He had believed this since his childhood, and his mother nursed it some, promising that he looked much more like his father than her. Sometimes he found himself wondering why he didn't look more like her, but understanding the biological answer to the question later on in life, dropped it, but had always possessed an absurd personal theory that it was because her genetics matched her social qualities. A childish Castiel believed that her soft, restrained personality stopped her from contributing to his physical traits somehow, and though he knew that couldn't possibly be true now, sometimes it was an amusing thought to revisit.

She handed him one of the cups of tea and he took a sip, not remembering how hot water could actually become when heated and ending up with a mouthful of sputtered tea all down the front of his shirt.

His mother handed him a napkin and shot him a concerned look through her light green eyes, but didn't say anything until he'd cleaned himself up to the best of his ability.

"Are you feeling alright?" She sounded genuinely concerned, and Castiel heard himself laugh on the outside, though he immediately wanted to smack himself at way her brow furrowed in confusion.

He nodded, "Yes, sorry."

"Are you sure?"  
He nodded again, his thoughts returning to last night and Dean sleeping in his bed upstairs. So no, he wasn't sure, but how was he supposed to explain that to his mother, of all people? _An old project partner of mine came over last night drunk and we made out in your living room. He's presently trying to sleep off a hangover in my bed, by the way. _No, of course not.

"Why do you ask?" Maybe an act of ignorance would make her change the subject.

She shook her head now, her chilly gaze not lingering from his once. "You seem a bit off this afternoon. Has anything happened recently?"

She knew. She'd seen Dean's car. Or she probably did. It was hard to miss and knowing Dean, he'd have parked it in their driveway in his drunken stupor of last night. Or maybe she'd heard him saying something to Dean when he was still upstairs as well as Dean's grumbled response. Maybe someone had told her all about how much time he and Dean had spent together as of late because of that project. Maybe she'd installed a camera in the corner of the ceiling and the walls of the living room and had seen photos of what he had let Dean do to him last night. _Maybe_ she could see the hickeys. Please, God, please don't let it be _that_.

"No, everything has been fine," Castiel assured, disgusted with himself for so easily lying to his own mother, "I overslept quite a bit this morning is all."

She nodded again and dropped the question and they entered a more casual, normal conversation about school and about her work and his father mostly. The two were hardly ever separate topics, seeing as the man was never idle. Apparently they had been looking into older investments as of late, ones like small businesses his father had helped in some way or another years ago whose owners vowed their eternal gratitude towards him, which seemed a bit extreme to the entire family to say the least.

"What condition is your room in today?" His mother asked, once they had tired out the previous conversation and finished the tea.

_Don't let her see the room. She'll see Dean and you'll be in trouble_. "It's fine."

"Fine?" She quirked her eyebrow at him, but smiled irresolutely.

_Well my bathroom could use a cleaning and the closet is a probably a complete pigsty at this point… oh, and there's a hung-over teenage boy sleeping in my bed. But other than that, it's totally fine!_

"Yes." He spat the word out, figuratively and literally; his mother wiped the spit from her eyelid with a light chuckle before starting up the stairs.

"Wait!" Castiel practically yelped, latching onto her wrist and stopping her from taking another step.

"Castiel, what has gotten into you?" She yanked back on her wrist, obviously tired of his admittedly strange antics and freeing herself as she continued to ascend the stairs, one clicking heel at a time.

Well there went the option of reasoning with her, really, but her heard himself start babbling excuses of why she shouldn't go in the room which ranged from palpable reasons to one that may or may not have involved the head of a goat.


	7. Without Inhibitions

~ Chapter Seven ~

Dean's throat is drier than the fucking desert, his stomach feels like its been twisted in knots, he feels on the brink of puking up whatever's left in his stomach, his muscles scream in agony whenever he tries to move and his brain feels like someone's taken it and played some serious, hardcore fucking tetherball with it its throbbing against his skull so hard. Going to sleep would probably help his situation, but against all rationality, Dean forces himself to stay with the awake and living. He can hear Cas and some lady downstairs and he has to wonder for a few moments about who the hell it could be. The dude's probably gay, so a girlfriend seems pretty far out of the question at this point, and the lady sounds older than that, so it's probably his mom or grandma or something. He can't make out any of what they're saying for a long while, it just sounds like a lot of grumbling through the walls, and they're clearly downstairs, so when they move into a different place than where Dean can hear the differently toned grumbles, he has no idea if they've stop talking or not, so he gives up for the moment.

His drunk brain from last night has left the building, leaving behind a sobbing hung-over one that's puking all over itself, the sober brain and then repeating the actions. His sober brain wants to fall asleep in this bed, probably Cas' bed, which he recognizes as really nice of the guy. Most guys their age would've kicked him out long ago. Then again, most guys their age wouldn't have unintentionally captured Dean's attention so easily and made drunk-him want to get in their pants so badly. Drunk Dean didn't even succeed at that – the little fucker.

He keeps thinking about this in slow circles, trying very hard to stay conscious and awake, just to hear the muted voices talking back and forth. He can distinguish between the two; the lady has a higher, softer voice, but its sharp too and if it were any closer it might be pricking at his brain; Cas has a somewhat soft voice too, but it's deep and damn rich and probably rolls right up through the walls towards Dean.

That's a weird image.

"_Castiel, what has gotten into you?_" The lady's voice and clear and concise and Dean almost jumps, except he can't. He hurts and his brain hurts. He can't tell if he actually can't move or if it'll just be really fucking complicated if he tries to do it.

He can't quite make out what Castiel's response was as he stands up, seeing as it sounds fast and mumbled, but Dean is rushing too. His limbs feel like they're made of cement and jello and he knows full well that he's not going to be getting anywhere fast.

He's gotten halfway across the room towards the open closet across from him, having decided just now that maybe he can hide in there if he moves fast enough and his hung-over brain thinks it's a pretty damn good idea, and he's making good time as he stomps across the room, his shoes too heavy at the moment. His sober brain knows too well though that it's not going to work and it's right. It's so right that it decides to shove it in his face, no, _his entire head_, repeatedly, pounding on the inside of his skull and doing the Macarena as a victory dance – the door clicks as it opens and Dean freezes.

He turns his head slowly, catching the lady, a very prim and proper middle-aged lady at that, jump nearly six feet in the air and gawk at him, then at Cas who is standing beside her with a similar shocked expression, except his has pain mixed in it with red cheeks and big blue eyes that look like they might burst into tears if he doesn't hold back.

"What- what is _this_?" The lady stammers, her voice raised as she points a rigid finger at Dean, though she doesn't look at him, glaring into Cas instead.

Cas looks horrified and ashamed and Dean can't quite figure out why; his head is still painfully throbbing. But Cas starts trying to explain and the lady who's probably his mom starts shaking her head at him and looking at him incredulously and Dean starts feeling very confused as to what he's supposed to do in this situation. He's never really been in anything like it, it's not like his own parents care too much when he comes home drunk, he's always sorry about it by himself by the time he sobers up and that's that. Sometimes his parents give him a talk about making bad choices and sometimes they don't, and usually if they don't, then Sam does, what with that righteous fucking attitude of his.

But Cas' mom just keeps shaking her head when Cas tries to explain to her that they didn't do anything and Dean is just a friend, which Dean wants to nod along with and tell the lady that it's true but he's not sure he can. His head hurts too much and his throat is too dry to formulate coherent sentences and even if he could, he's positive he would be lying. They _did_ do stuff last night, and Dean's not sure if he likes that they did or if they just skipped themselves right out of the friend-zone or not – this is all really weird, and it will probably feel even weirder once he's sobered up.

He can only watch Cas' pained expression grow as his mom takes over the bulk of their conversation, turning it into what seems like a one-way shouting match before she storms out of the room, down the stairs and slams the front door too. Cas tries to catch up with her for a short while but stops once he hits the top of the stairs, and Dean watches with a heavy, guilty heart as the kid's shoulders drop and he turns around, making his way over to the window of the bedroom, probably watching his mom drive away.

Neither of them says anything for a few moments: Cas stands by the window, his fists clenching and unclenching at his sides and Dean keeps swallowing, trying to make his mouth okay for talking.

"Cas, I'm–" he finally tries and fails when Cas cuts him off.

"No."

"But I'm sorry." His voice comes out an octave or five higher than what he wanted it to and he cringes internally at it.

"No, you're not." Cas snaps back, finally turning around to face him. The dude's face is all red, and his eyes look ridiculously bloodshot around the blue, but that might be Dean's hung-over-ness making him look like that.

Dean opens his mouth to say something, to tell Cas that he's wrong maybe, but he's not even sure where to go with that, let alone start apologizing.

"Cas," he tries again, his voice squeaking out once more.

"_No_, Dean." And there's no arguing with that tone of voice and the hand that jerks towards the door. "Get out of my house and don't come back."

His tone couldn't have been more laced with ice and anger and frustration, yet Dean could not have gotten out of there faster. The cement and jello in his legs had disappeared somehow and he was stumbling down the stairs and out the door to his car as fast as his legs could possibly carry him.

_God_, he was going to have to apologize for this the next time he saw Cas.

/

Castiel drummed his fingers on his bare desk, eyes grazing over the clean space. He had a few college applications to do tonight, but all his homework was done fairly early for a Thursday. He had a blank document open, titled college application essay on top with his name and the date, but nothing written. The little line blinked, letting him know it was ready to go, ready to catch all the words he would need to apply to this and that college, but he couldn't think properly. In the back of his mind, he knew that he'd already done a lot, having sent about eleven applications to various colleges over the past few months, but ever since his mother grounded him, she'd also started calling more frequently, making sure he was either doing his homework, editing a college app or some other productive task.

What was more though, was the fact that she was taking half the century to forgive him. Only he could be blamed for that, yes, and she didn't even understand half of the real story, but it had been three weeks since "the event" in her words. It was getting ridiculous. Castiel had thought that his mother was the more forgiving parent, expecting her to have forgotten about this mishap long ago, but she wouldn't. Or she couldn't. Either way, it was getting exasperatingly tedious. Wasn't making mistakes part of adolescence?

Apparently not for him, and on his mother's terms, he had rushed to and from school, "getting the most out of his education", as she had so blindly put it. That was what infuriated him most presently.

It wasn't the punishment, or the lack thereof one, that was appalling. It wasn't the fact that she didn't trust Castiel quite the same either – he knew he deserved that. It was the fact that she hadn't bothered to learn even half of what had happened. She didn't know that Dean had somehow driven himself to their house at a rather inebriated and hopeless state. She didn't know that Castiel couldn't have persuaded Dean to go home, and even if he could have, he wouldn't have done it, for the fear of a friend getting in an accident. In a way, it was responsible thinking, or that was what he would've justified his story with, leaving out the part about the kissing and rutting against one another in the living room; he was still relentlessly pleased that she hadn't found out about that. As long as he had any say in it, she wouldn't ever find out. But she still did have a very flawed story for what she believed happened: to her, Dean was just a bad influence, coming over in his intoxicated state, distracting Castiel from schoolwork and eventually passing out on his bed.

Okay, maybe Dean was some or all of those things, but Castiel didn't like his mother thinking that about him. It was strange; the more he thought about his mother's so shallowly created opinion of this person he wasn't even sure he could call a friend, the angrier he became. Was that normal? It didn't seem normal.

Halfway through a college application, it dawned on Castiel that he needed to talk to someone about this. He picked up his phone and opened up his contacts list, looking at the first name: Anna. Talking to her in the past had been extremely helpful, especially talking through problems with his family. They had found that their two families were undeniably similar, and that was the uniting force between them and the basis for the beginning of their friendship. An understanding.

"Hello?" It was Anna's energetic voice on the other end of the line.

"Anna, it's Castiel."

"Hey, Cas, what's up?"

"I want to talk to you."

"What about?"

This is how they started talking. They started with Castiel explaining, down to the last detail, of what happened with Dean three Fridays ago, how Dean hadn't said anything to him since, how it seemed like he's been ignored by Dean, how is mom doesn't trust him any longer and how much he _detests_ writing the college applications. Anna didn't talk while he did, only snuffling when she found something he said amusing. It was a relief to chat with Anna like this, even though she could quite easily air on the side of quaint and peculiar. It was one of the qualities so many people found endearing about her, Castiel thought to himself, smiling a bit when Anna nearly started squealing about him and Dean.

"God, he has it so bad for you." She squeaked, and Castiel could see her in his mind's eye spinning around in her chair or jumping up and down on her bed. That was the type of girl she was.

"Anna, no," he hated to break this kind of excitement of hers, but listening to her squeal hadn't been on his agenda. "I don't think he does. He was very drunk."

Anna's whine through the phone was crystal clear. "That's not how it works, Cas."

He cringed at the tone of her voice when using that nickname. Only Dean called him that, and it sounded weird coming out of Anna's mouth.

"What do you mean?"

"When you're drunk, you have more confidence, right?" She didn't wait for him to answer, "They get more confident in a sloppy way and they do things that they wouldn't normally do because of nerves or fear or whatever that being drunk takes away."

He didn't know that. "Really?"

"Yeah!" She chirped through the line, though Castiel didn't really hear her – his head was racing way too fast. He needed to call Dean _now_, was what he needed to do.

"Anna?" Castiel finally asked after several moments of unbearable silence.

"Call him and figure it out, dumbass." Her tone was playful in ways it usually was, but at the same time, it was all business.

"Thank you." He grumbled into the phone before hanging up and scrolling as fast as the phone would allow to Dean's name.

It rang once. Twice. Three times. By the time the fourth was sounding, Castiel was ready to hang up. It was 8:30 and Dean was probably doing something – he answered.

"Hello?" He sounded somewhat garbled on the end of the line, like he was out somewhere with really bad cell phone connectivity.

"Um, hello, Dean?"

An awkward pause.

"Cas?"

"Yes. How are you?" Exchanging common courtesies felt uncomfortable, especially since Dean somehow made him skip over it when they had had conversations in the past. Something about Dean and Castiel's normal manners and behavior worked strangely together. Not necessarily unpleasantly, but strange nonetheless.

"I'm, uh, I'm alright. You?"

"I'm fine, I actually wanted to talk to you about something."

"Yeah, I figured. What's up?"

Castiel exhaled, searching for words to say, proper grammar to use, punctuation, something. What did he want to talk about? This was such a poorly thought out idea. "Do you know my friend Anna?"

"The redhead?"

"Yes."

"Yeah?"

"I talked to her earlier and we came to the conclusion that I should talk to you about what happened between us three weeks ago." He clenched his fist and thumped it against his leg, berating himself for sounding so awkward. This wasn't how normal human beings conversed.

"Oh." Dean sounded deflated, even saddened, if Castiel heard that correctly; he licked his lips hoping his silence would encourage a response out of him. "I was kinda hoping we could forget about that."

"What?" He didn't know what he was expecting Dean to say, but it certainly wasn't along those lines.

"Whaddya mean 'what'?" He sounded defensive. "Don't tell me you actually wanted to have a chat about _that_."

"I did though."

An audible sigh from Dean.

"Well how long can two people avoid talking about something like this?"

"You'd be surprised, buddy." Buddy? When did they become friends and why hadn't Castiel known about it?

"It just seems like a glaring omission to me that we've avoided it so long." He felt a blush in his cheeks as well as a wash of relief that Dean couldn't actually see him right now.

He could hear something on the other side of the line though, another voice in addition to Dean's, though it was higher and just as garbled as when Dean responded to it. Maybe it was someone younger than him? Castiel couldn't tell.

"Hey, Cas, can we talk about this at school tomorrow instead? I've really got to go handle something right now."

"Of course."

"Thanks, I'll, uh, see you later then."

"Yes."

_Click._


	8. A Certain DW

~ Chapter 8 ~

Dean didn't know what to expect out of talking with Castiel at lunch that day, but he sure hadn't expected it to grow and flourish into something he actually enjoyed.

They met up during lunch; okay, it was more like Cas catching Dean by the arm as they walked out of fifth period, because Dean almost forgot about what they'd agreed to do, but what difference did it make?

Cas had dragged him over by their lockers to get his lunch and books for the classes after lunch, which was right around the time when he noticed that Dean had no lunch today and forcibly shared half of his. They ended up sitting outside in center court of the school on the other side of the big oak tree from where Cas' friends sat, since Dean didn't think Cas would want to sit behind the school with the bunch of guys he'd been hanging out with lately. They were pretty damn annoying, Dean thought, nibbling on the edges of half a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, playing over the way they teased him the Monday after the party he left early from. He'd managed to tune most of their jabs out but the physical pokes and shoves couldn't be ignored as easily; he gulped.

"Dean?"

He jumped a little, looking up into Cas' confused eyes. "Sorry, I spaced out."

Castiel nodded his understanding and chewed his half of the sandwich, glancing up at him occasionally. Weren't they supposed to be talking here?

"So," Dean started, clapping the crumbs of the sandwich out of his hands, realizing simultaneously that he had no idea where he had intended to go with that starter.

"I'm not angry about this." Cas blurted and it was Dean's turn again to look startled.

"What?"

Castiel shook his head, "Sorry, I meant that I'm not angry about what you did to me, what we did, a while ago. I know I probably should be, but I'm not." He'd rambled all this, and there was a strangely familiar pink blush blooming in his cheeks that made Dean want to smile; he restrained the urge.

"Really?" His voice came out as a squeak, but there was nothing he could do to help that, and Cas didn't even seem to notice or care.

Cas nodded.

"You mean your mom didn't bust you for having some hung-over dude in your bed?"

"No, I don't mean that at all. I was grounded from then until yesterday, but what I meant was that I'm not angry at all about what you did. I don't know if you worried about that or not, but if I were in your shoes I might have."

Dean shook his head, both indicating that he hadn't worried, which now dawned on him as strange, but also trying to get the image this clean, neat, smart guy being totally wasted out of his head. "I was trying to forget about the whole thing, to be honest."

"Oh." Was that disappointment in his voice? Oh God, don't let it be disappointment, he really did not want to think about the fact that Cas might've actually liked making out with Dean while he was sloppy and drunk.

"That's good."

"It is?"

"Well, yeah. I was probably over-thinking it." Cas' blue eyes shimmered with an unreadable emotion, but Dean was a lot distracted by how dark they looked in the shade of the tree. Blue eyes were cool, he thought to himself, biting his tongue to keep from grinning like a weirdo.

They sat in silence again for a few minutes, while Cas tried to divide up the rest of his lunch, which really didn't work, and they ended up bumping hands every time they reached for a corn chip in its tiny plastic bag. Every time it would happen, Cas would mumble an apology to which Dean would either just shake his head or tell him not to say sorry so much.

Somewhere around when the corn chips ran out, Cas started up the conversation, obviously feeling just as awkward as Dean, but he asked good questions. The bulk of their conversation then was about where Dean was from, to which he explained that his Dad was in the military, so they had to move around a lot, and wouldn't stay in one place for very long. Four years seemed to be the maximum to Dean this far, and that was currently the allotted time frame for Pontiac, Illinois. But he was seventeen, so he would only have to be here for the rest of this year and next and then he could go wherever he wanted for college or something.

College was another good topic of conversation – Castiel explained how his parents wanted him to go to a private religious college that had an extremely high level of prestige, but that he wanted to attend a different kind of college, a bigger one, maybe out in California or Washington state. Dean listened, agreeing with Castiel's opinions for the most part, at least on the location of said schools, but not the actual schooling part; he didn't like going to school, never had and probably never would, but Cas seemed to like it enough, and wanted to go to this or that college on the west coast to "broaden his horizons" or something. Dean then explained how he would only go to a college to perfect a certain skill set to use on a career that he would enjoy for the rest of his life, rather than wasting his time with more courses on subjects he didn't even like to begin with. Cas, the nice guy he was, just nodded along and sort of smiled while Dean described all this and asked what he planned to become when he was older.

"A mechanic." Dean rubbed at the back of his neck after saying it, realizing how lame it actually sounded while talking to Castiel who had just confessed his wish to travel widely and learn language, study abroad or something like that. Dean wasn't into traveling that didn't involve the Impala, and he was scared shitless of flying; not that he'd ever admit that to another living soul.

"That's cool."

Dean raised his eyebrows at Cas, "Are you serious?"

He nodded, "Yes. I don't think I know of anyone else who wants to do that."

He couldn't say anything to that, just nodded and laughed a bit; it was a relief to hear someone say that. Other people didn't realize understand or get what was so appealing about the job to him, only that it was a "dirty job" and he should strive for bigger and better things because he would be selling himself short with that job. Dean told Castiel this and the wholly surprised look on his face made him laugh – he looked cute like that. And there was that word again. _Cute_.

/

When the bell rang for lunch to end, Castiel stood and offered a hand to Dean, who accepted it and allowed himself to pulled up off the ground. They had Art together next, something neither of them had known until that day, seeing as they would situate themselves on opposite sides of the room with every passing day. Go figure.

They walked into class today though, and Dean pointed out the wide desk in the corner where he normally did his work, close to the door and away from most other people who wanted to be closer to the cabinets of art supplies. They sat there today, and listened silently while the colorful teacher explained that they would be continuing to work on their freeform paintings, which seemed to make Dean happy. He said it was because he wasn't very good with a paintbrush and their teacher thought his piece looked "intriguing and abstract" when he made a mistake. Castiel laughed at this, and looked over at Dean's painting where it sat, much larger than his on the easel; he displayed his as well, though it was only a drawing at this point, as he had been spending a long time trying to get all the details in pencil correct before he started painting. This technique infuriated every art teacher he'd ever had, but Castiel shrugged it off, remembering how good it felt to have something precise and meticulously drawn to paint over.

What he'd been working on for the past week or so was a medium-sized canvas, slightly smaller than Dean's with a careful illustration of a feather on it. Dean said he liked it, and liked how real it looked.

"What color is it going to be?"

"The feather?"

"Yeah."

He hadn't thought of this yet. "What do you think it should be?"

Dean looked at the drawing and then down at the multiple bottles of paint he placed on the table between their easels. "The black paint is the only good, smooth kind we have here."

"A black feather it is, then."

Dean smirked, a sort of smug expression, Castiel thought, but he liked it. It fit Dean in a strange but comforting way that probably wouldn't look quite as good on anyone else. He seemed to have those kinds of qualities, Castiel thought while dipping a fine brush into the paint and dragging it along the edge of the container to remove the excess.

Painting the feather went smoothly and much faster than the actual drawing had, Castiel being ever the perfectionist with the pencil, but Dean was right about the paint; it was good paint. It wasn't chunky and slick like most of the other colors were from use. He grinned as he mixed black and white on the plastic palette, attempting to make the right shade of gray for the spine of the feather. He heard Dean laugh softly beside him, and a familiar blush bloomed in Castiel's cheeks; being with Dean seemed to have this effect on him.

"Looks good." Dean mumbled while they packed up the rest of the supplies and put the paintings in appropriate racks to dry until the next class.

"_Thank you. I like yours as well_." That was what Castiel had meant to say, though a couple letters were skipped over by his tongue and the sentence came out as, "Thank you. I like you as well."

His cheeks felt like they were on fire all at once, and Castiel was struggling to explain that he had meant to say 'yours' not 'you', but that Dean would be a good friend to have anyways, all while Dean grinned and blushed as well.

"I get it, Cas. Don't worry."

They both had to go to their last period classes then, and for Castiel, that was Japanese. Dean had English in the same hallway and he seemed to be marginally excited about it, though he denied it when asked. He just said that they were reading a book in class that was really good, to which Castiel replied that yes, it was common that people read books in an English class. Dean rolled his eyes and laughed at this, but clapped Castiel on the shoulder before he sauntered into his class.

When he walked into Japanese, his seat beside Anna was open and he sat down beside her; she gave him a quizzical look.

"What are you so smiley about?"

"What do you mean?" He hadn't realized he was smiling.

She raised an eyebrow at him and nodded briefly, a wide grin on her face. "Does it have to do with a certain D.W.?"

"D.W.?"

She rolled her eyes. "God, you're clueless. Dean. Does it have to do with Dean?"

"Oh," he cast his gaze down at the ground between their desks, studying the scratches on the floor from moving seats. "I suppose so."

Anna's grin doubled twofold and she bounced around in her seat, making a scene until the teacher asked her to settle down before class began.

Balthazar walked in next and took his seat behind Castiel and asked what Anna was so excited about. She leaned over in her seat and drummed on his desk while explaining that Castiel had a crush on Dean and he was being very smiley about it, and that she thought they would totally be a thing by the end of the school year. Castiel turned away from her in his seat, trying to both hide his blush and the expression on his face that was twisting from embarrassed to joyous about Anna's predictions.

Class started, but all he could concentrate on was that he thought he'd come to terms with the fact that he couldn't have a crush on Dean by now; he figured that he could ignore the flutter of nerves in his stomach when he saw Dean, or dismiss them as something that happened because Dean was a bad influence and naturally someone like that would make Castiel nervous. But now, he wasn't so sure.

Now there were new smiles and accidents that turned out sweet and that made the situation all the more simple and all the more complicated. Simple because he might actually be developing a bad crush on Dean Winchester, and complicated in that he was at war with his romantic inclinations again, seeing as the last time he felt this way was eighth grade and he'd had a crush on his male history teacher. An entire group of kids had learned this some way or another and he'd been made fun of for the rest of the year, in that class especially. He had never fully understood why people had to make fun of him for this, call him a queer and a faggot and most other derogatory names they could think of, regardless of whether they were actual, valid insults. Then again, Castiel thought, chewing his lip as he scribbled down notes, that event was at the Catholic school he used to attend. Most of the kids there went to another religiously affiliated high school instead of the local public school, excluding him, Anna and Balthazar. Balthazar had been his friend throughout their elementary schooling, though he was an interesting sort of kid. He was friends with everyone really, or anyone who had a good sense of humor; which was why Castiel found it difficult to believe that he would often spend lunch sessions with him rather than with someone who was far more interesting. Balthazar had reassured him then that he was interesting too because of the stories he had to tell and that his lack of understanding of the types of humor was what made him funny, whatever that meant.

The final bell rang and Castiel was up and half-running to his locker in three and a half seconds, but trying to appear as casual as he could when he finally caught up with Dean who had just stepped out of his English class with a subdued grin on his face. Dean talked about the book his class was reading, The Great Gatsby, the entire way to their lockers and then out to the student parking lot. His eyes were alive, bright and green when he talked about his favorite characters and what was happening in the book, and even though Castiel had already read the book earlier in the year, he found himself enjoying listening to Dean talk about it, as if it was all new to him too.

Upon walking to the student parking lot, Castiel couldn't see Dean's car, but that was apparently because Dean had had to walk to school today because his dad was using the car.

"Would you like a ride home?" Castiel felt himself asking instinctually, his fingers anxiously fumbling with the keys as he tried to coax them out of a pocket in his backpack.

"Yeah, but I live pretty far from the school. I can take a bus." Dean's tone was sure and confident, though he sounded irritated enough that he would have to use public transportation.

"I'll drive you home." He hadn't even thought about saying it before it was out of his mouth and he had grasped Dean's bicep and gently tugged on his arm towards his car.

"Really, Cas, you don't need to do this, I can get myself home."

"I know you can, but I'd like to do this."

They had reached the car by now, Castiel climbing into the driver's seat while Dean hesitated for a moment before sliding into the passenger seat and shutting the door. He looked extremely uncomfortable just sitting in his seat while being driven, making Castiel feel as though he had made a mistake in deciding to do this.

"Dean?"

They had just pulled up to a stop sign outside the school; Dean didn't say a word, just made eye contact and raised his eyebrows expectantly.

"Tell me more about your book."

Dean chuckled at this and rifled through his wholly disorganized backpack, looking for the book. He was talking about it by the time it was in his hands, grumbling about the recent chapter and how he didn't like this or that character. Castiel smiled and nodded, glancing over at Dean occasionally while he drove, trying both to be engaged in the conversation and drive at the same time. It wasn't that difficult to do in actuality, because when they finally got out of the congested after-school zone, it was mostly straight, empty streets. Dean gave directions periodically, most of them being go straight until a certain point and then to turn left at another before going straight again. And he hadn't lied about living far away from the school – they'd driven for almost a forty-five minutes now, though it only felt like fifteen.

/

"It's right over here." Dean directed, pointing at the one-story house on the end of a block. It had an overgrown, weedy lawn and a splintering wooden porch, beaten by the weather, much like the front door. He blushed as he jammed the book back into his backpack, suddenly more embarrassed then he'd ever been in his life; compared to Castiel's house, his was a total dump. "Sorry about the place, man." He mumbled, pulling the backpack into his lap.

"Why are you sorry about it?"

Dean shrugged, "It looks like crap."

"I don't think so." The overwhelming sincerity in his tone was incredible and, for lack of a better word, overwhelming.

"Well thanks for the ride."

"Of course."

The chill of the outside air nipped at the bare skin on his face as he headed for the front door, stumbling over the short steps and praying to whatever non-existent God was out there that Cas didn't see that. But hold the fuck up – when did he start caring about what some dorky guy thought about him? Oh, right, when that dorky guy was generally adorable with blue eyes, perpetual sex-hair and a better smile than anyone else he'd met. And he'd met a lot of people in his seventeen years.

Kneeling down, Dean lifted up the 'Welcome Home' mat on the ground only to discover that there was no key underneath. Just his luck.

Dean jammed his hands in his pockets, grumbling all the way over to Cas' car, who was already rolling down the window. "Is there a problem?"

"Yeah, Sam must've taken the damn house key with him on his way to school today. It's not under the mat where it's supposed to be."

"Sam?" Don't think about how cute he looks when he cocks his head like that. Just don't.

"My kid brother."

"Oh." Cas nodded and motioned for Dean to get back in the car again; he complied, barely restraining a happy sigh as he slid back in the warm car.

"My mom's at work until like eight tonight and my dad's out of town at the moment, so I think we have to wait until Sam gets back from soccer practice."

"Do you know when that is?"

"He's usually back around 5:30, but it's a Friday, so he might be with a friend until later."

Castiel nodded and glanced over at the house for a moment, it seemed like he was contemplating whether or not he could will the front door to open or something before turning his head back to face Dean. "Are you close to your brother?"

Dean nodded, understanding that he knew more about Sammy than any other living soul aside from their parents, whether or not he liked that. "Yeah."

"That's nice."

Silence.

"Do you have any siblings?"

"No, I'm an only-child."

"That sounds kinda nice too, ya know."

Cas smiled but shook his head. "It's a little boring, but I think after seventeen years I'm used to it."

Dean looked out the window now, past Cas at house, willing someone to magically come home with keys. He should have known better than to leave his keys at home today, but they were on the same ring as the car keys, which his dad took, so it didn't feel like his fault, but it was. _Damn_. And now here he was, trying to make small talk with Castiel, who had been nice enough to drive him home but was now pretty much stuck with him considering his inability to get this together ahead of time.

"Dean, are you alright?" His voice startled him out of his grumpy reverie, and he was back, staring into those far too blue eyes.

"Yeah, why?"

"You look angry all of a sudden."

"Oh, well yeah. But at myself for leaving my keys on the ring."

Castiel chewed his lip for a moment before glancing over at Dean with a curious expression on his face. "Would you like to wait at my house in the meantime?"

Dean internally cringed; this was what he was afraid of, more or less. He was positive spending more time with the dorkiest guy he'd met yet would make him even antsier around him at school. Antsy wasn't a bad thing, exactly, it was just that when Dean got antsy, he got weird, and he weird could probably be interpreted to seeming gay, which he _still_ wasn't. But saying no to Cas right here would be more than just awkward; Cas would probably just suggest that they wait in the car until someone got home and could let Dean in, and that would lead spawn some more uncomfortable small talk, and right when Dean thought they'd finally moved past that. "Uh, yeah, sure."

/

It was only five o'clock by the time they had gotten to Castiel's home and were sitting in his room upon his request that Dean not look at the messy condition of the living room. While pushing him up the stairs, he explained that the room was very disorganized and unclean and needed to be vacuumed and dusted over the weekend. In actuality, he just didn't want to have to sit in the same room Dean had kissed him, lest it made him remember what happened; trying to forget about that was difficult though. Dean had a way of kissing that went unmatched to any other that Castiel had ever had, and that made him want to wince at the sheer abnormality of the thought and daydream about it for several hours on end. It was ridiculous.

But Dean didn't seem to be thinking about that while he sipped at the cup of coffee in his hands and flipped through an old magazine Castiel had laying somewhere in his room. He didn't even realize he had it in there, which was the interesting part, Dean just seemed to pull it out of thin air before settling into the desk chair. Castiel sat down, cross-legged on his bed, and pulled out some Japanese homework and started working on that.

It was a rather long assignment; so long, in fact, that he was only three-fourths finished with it by the time Dean had finished thoroughly reading through the magazine. Dean leaned forward, his elbows on his knees as he tried to peer over at what Castiel was doing, who shifted his book and paper over to his other knee to let Dean see the scribbled characters.

"What's that?"

"Homework."  
"I got that, Cas. What language is it in?"

"Japanese."

"Isn't that a really tough language to learn?"

"I suppose. I don't find it very challenging."

Dean nodded and Castiel went back to scribbling in silence, only to have a question come to mind. "What language are you taking?"

"I'm not."

"Why is that?"

"I already took two years of French at the last school I was at."

Castiel snuffled, grinning at the thought of Dean speaking flawless French.

"What's so funny?" His tone sounded amused too though, and Castiel allowed himself to smile as he looked up at him.

"Why did you take French?"

"Oh," a sweet, rosy blush spread across Dean's cheeks, "cause' ladies love French." He looked embarrassed to have to explain that, and Castiel felt bad for asking.

"They do?"

"Yeah. I mean, I think so."

Castiel nodded, swallowing hard. "I wouldn't know, so I'll take your word for it."

That sparked Dean's interest.

"You wouldn't know?" There was that strangely amused tone again.

Castiel shook his head, eyeing Dean as quizzically as he could.

"What, haven't you ever been with a girl?"

"Of course I have." Okay, that was pretty much a lie. The last time he was "with a girl" was at a school dance in seventh grade; furthermore, that girl was Anna, and they ended up being good friends, so that quite clearly did not work the way either of them had expected. "It was a while ago, though."

Dean nodded and leaned back in the chair, propping up his feet on the edge of Castiel's bed in a way that would annoy him extremely had it been anyone else and had those boots not been cleaner than expected.

"What about guys?"

What _about_ guys?"

Dean shifted in the seat a bit. "Have you ever been with a guy then?"

"Oh." Castiel chewed his tongue, he'd been feeling comfortable with Dean, so telling him the truth wouldn't hurt, right? "Yeah, I have."

"Really?" His tone now sounded amused too, but also kind of interested, green eyes bright and curious.

He nodded. "Will that be a problem?"

"For me? No. Not at all. Just curious, ya know?"

Yes, he did know that feeling, that curiosity; he returned the favor. "What about you?"

"What about me what?"

Castiel glared into him unintentionally, he hated doing this. Going around in circles and beating around the bush with conversation was last on the list of things he ever intended or wanted to do if it could be helped. "You know exactly what I mean, Dean."

Dean rolled his eyes now, dropping his little charade, though even that couldn't have prepared Castiel for the surprise Dean's answer provided:

"Once. And yes, really."


	9. Anna's Plan and Dean's Party

~ Chapter 9~

The sun was shining, birds were singing, the sky was as blue as blue could be – a perfect day to get Castiel his boyfriend. Those two had been ogling at each other for about three months now, from the time Dean showed up, to now, early April, yet they'd only done anything when she had forced them, or when one of them was drunk. She had to hand it to Dean's drunkenness though– it did a lot of the work for her.

Then again, that was what, four weeks ago? Anna had no idea, but it had been a long time and that needed to change, and soon, before she got tired and bored of their non-antics. Balthazar agreed, seeing as they both had been friends with Cassie basically since they started school. They had both come to a consensus that their best friend needed some real action, not the kind that the dumbass had gotten himself into a few times last year with guys who just wanted to get in his pants. He deserved better than that.

How or why Balthazar believed Anna when she explained that Dean was what Castiel deserved, she had no idea, but the lack of questioning was pretty cool. Basically though, they had agreed that when Cas wasn't chasing or being chased, he was sad. Sad and boring, actually, and Anna had had enough of sad, boring Castiel. The dorky guy wasn't either of those things, but God, did he have a problem coming out of his little shell. Or maybe his closet. Whichever was more accurate.

All this was what spawned what Anna cleverly named "Operation Dean-Cas". She'd thought of it while at church for Easter, during spring break, and the idea and plan only blossomed and grew perfectly with each passing moment. She could barely focus on being a respectable family member at home during the holiday, rushing upstairs to the whiteboard in her bedroom to scribble down an idea or seven. It was the week after spring break though, a Wednesday, actually, and the scheduled start day for the operation and phase one.

Anna was in trig right now, the one and only class she had with both Dean and Castiel. Their teacher never really cared where Anna chose to sit every day, as she had one of the best grades in the class, and that gave her special rights or something. Either way, she sat beside Dean's usual seat partner today, a pretty, blonde girl named Jo Harvelle that worked at the local diner.

Anna struck up a conversation with Jo, ignoring the girl's brief look of confusion when she stole Dean's usual seat, but she lightened up eventually and reciprocated the small talk and whether or not last night's homework made sense, which it did, as long as you followed the directions in the book and not the teacher's. Castiel walked in sometime during this conversation, just nodding at Anna as he walked in, sipping from his travel mug as he took a seat in the back. People kept filing in, and Anna couldn't help but glancing at the door while organizing and reorganizing her notebook, waiting for a very confused Dean to wander in late, as usual, and have to go sit in the only remaining seat: one in the back beside none other than Castiel Novak.

The bell rang and therefore Dean walked in a few moments behind it, and all went according to plan. Anna gave him her best smile and wave, ignoring the puzzlement Jo shot at her and the annoyed look Dean shot at Jo, beginning to focus on the lesson the teacher was just starting. The lesson only took thirty minutes to give and when everyone's attention started dropping off, the teacher got the message and gave them an assignment to do until the bell rang.

Anna took this as an opportunity to stand up and sharpen her pencil, though she purposefully walked between Dean and Castiel's desks, hitting the pencil on Castiel's desk so that it fell between their desks as she walked away. She heard two simultaneously spoken sorry's before the pencil sharpener got too loud. When she turned around, Dean was bent over the bar of his desk, picking up the pencil while Castiel leaned forward slightly, watching him with what were probably red cheeks. The back of his neck was bright red anyways so either he'd gotten a gnarly sunburn over spring break, which didn't seem likely for Castiel, or he was just blushing because of Dean.

That, basically, was what phase one consisted of: doing everything in her power to make the two love-struck idiots to invade each other's personal space as much as possible. And it worked out pretty well, once Anna informed Balthazar of the plan. Hell, she'd even gone out of her way on Friday after class to explain to Jo what she'd been doing with Dean and Castiel. Jo had laughed at it but told her she thought it was clever anyways, and that she hoped it worked for Dean's sake. Apparently they lived across the street from one another and had known each other since they were babies, so Dean was like a brother to her; Jo offered assistance of her own too, saying that Dean needed to get in a solid relationship with _someone_, everyone who'd known him as long as she had agreed, and whether it was with a girl or a boy, she didn't care. Anna liked that about Jo, it made her stand out a bit more in her mind as a friend, or at least a valuable ally in this mission.

And that was how they formed phase two of Operation Dean-Cas.

/

Dean was sitting with Castiel again, and he was having a hard time trying to hide his undying excitement from Dean. He said that the only reason he kept sitting with Castiel and his small group of his friends lately was because he liked sitting with Jo, and she was taking to Anna these days. Anna and Jo weren't exactly two people Castiel would've put together as friends on his own, but they seemed to have a chemistry that drew people near them, including Balthazar and Inias who had been good friends for years because they were neighbors, and there wasn't anything to dislike about having a group of six instead of a group of three or four. Well, there hadn't been, really, until Friday at lunch.

Anna had assumed her increasingly usual spot next to Jo and across from Castiel, before she started directing all of her attention towards Dean, speaking in a tone of voice that though Castiel was unfamiliar with, was what he could identify as flirtatious. She would laugh a little too long at Dean's jokes or brush his hand with hers and practically begged for a goodbye hug after the bell rang to go to class. And with every irritating little advancement she made towards him, the more Castiel's stomach churned and ached. What had gotten into her?

And _God_, what had gotten into Dean? He was basically ignoring Jo and Castiel, something he never did, in favor of Anna, which was strange, if Castiel did say so himself. Dean seemed to be naturally charismatic when it came to people and he would include everyone in a conversation, which had been a bit more endearing than Castiel had expected, but not disliked. But now that Anna was just centering in on him, he was returning the favor and flirting back in such a sickeningly _perfect_ way.

The ache in his stomach just grew and grew in the remaining two periods of the day, even when they were walking to their lockers and Dean started happily talking about how 'stoked' he was that he had the house to himself over the weekend and that he was going to throw a party or something. He had it all figured out too, how he was going to try to have it all in the backyard because his parents would kill him if there was a mess inside, and how he wouldn't have to worry about Sammy, his younger brother, being kept awake and complaining about how loud everyone was outside when he was trying to sleep because he would be at a friend's house for a sleepover. He mentioned too, how people were probably going to start showing up at around eight o'clock.

"It's going to be awesome." Dean was drumming on the door of Castiel's locker when he said this.

"I'm happy for you, Dean." Castiel gave him his best fake smile, though it felt extremely awkward.

"Thanks. I invited Anna and Jo too, in case you wanted to come?" Dean trailed off at the end, sounding a little sheepish, and it was a little hard to hear him, but he understood anyways.

"I'm not sure." They were walking towards the parking lot now, and Castiel was clenching and unclenching his grip around the book in his hand as he walked, trying to make sense of the haze of confusing emotions. He was annoyed with Dean, he really was, but he couldn't explain why that was to him; it was unrealistic that Dean would understand why he was irritated anyways, and Castiel couldn't even rationalize it to himself. He was greatly annoyed with Dean because he felt jealous? No. Well, yes, but he didn't plan on admitting that to him.

"C'mon, man, it'll be fun." Dean punched him lightly on the arm, and gave him a dazzlingly white grin accompanied with bright, stunning green eyes that left Castiel a little more than speechless; he nodded dumbly in agreement before they climbed into their separate cars. He doubted he even owned something adequate enough to wear to a party.

Castiel had made the mistake of showing up early, at 7:45 and was made to help Dean prepare the backyard for the party. That really just meant helping Dean set up an old folding table he found in his garage and blow up a few balloons to tie to the gate to tell people to go in through the side gate not the front door. Mary Winchester was apparently a stickler for the cleanliness of her home, like Castiel's mother.

"How many people are coming?" Castiel asked as they attempted to unfold and lock the table underneath the patio light, where it was easier to see the tiny rusty mechanisms of the table. He'd been meaning to ask that since he arrived, mainly because he was hoping not that many people would arrive, but knowing how people seemed to like Dean as much as he did, there would most likely be a lot of people.

"Depends on who shows up."

Castiel was right about his suspicion. Jo and Anna were there first, arm in arm as they strode in, sort of stumbling over each other as they did so. Dean greeted both of them for a little longer than Castiel admitted to liking, especially Anna, who had dressed herself in a pair of very skinny black jeans and a red top with almost no back. Jo was dressed decently at least, in a leather jacket that eventually was removed to uncover her own top of the same effect. They both looked very good, Castiel decided, but he wasn't attracted to them like Dean was. Then again, Dean was the life of the party, Castel realized as he watched as more people filed in through the side gate from where he sat, perched on the railing that surrounded the patio. He felt strange sitting there, and not just because the railing was cold and slightly uncomfortable. He liked Dean a lot, he had been realizing throughout the week and now continuing and speeding up while he sat on the railing, and though he tried not to feel jealous – he had nothing to feel jealous about – he still couldn't help it. People liked Dean a lot. Girls squealed and hugged him when they arrived and guys greeted him just as warmly, with some kind of hug that Castiel only ever saw guys give each other; it didn't seem fair, but Castiel wasn't being very fair. He and Dean were not involved in any way just because they spent time together occasionally and he knew it, but some insignificant and horribly stubborn part of him just kept denying that fact. Withdrawing his attention from Dean, Castiel found Jo next. Jo attracted a crowd of her own wherever she went, she seemed to glide with every step, the blonde hair of hers creating a certain bouncy, undeniable light about the girl that drew in everyone and created loud, friendly conversations. Anna had a similar effect, though she would mill about quickly, integrating herself into all the conversations she could, though it was interesting that no one minded her doing that. Dean exuded a similar presence as the host. Though he, along with everyone that Castiel could recognize was at least _slightly_ inebriated by the end of the night.

Balthazar had arrived sometime during the night, or maybe he'd been around the entire time and Castiel simply hadn't noticed from his increasingly uncomfortable spot, but he approached anyways, carrying two cans of beer, greeting him warmly with a few jokes or two. He handed a beer to Castiel as he sat down silently and began people watching while Castiel could only look at the cold can of beer in his hands, debate whether or not to drink it and wonder why he was even considering this now.

Castiel stumbled out of the bathroom inside the house, leaning against the wall for cold, comfortable support. People were leaving now, as it had been hours since the party began and Balthazar handed him the beer; he could see the car lights through the window in the hallway and it dawned on him that it would be a good idea to go home too. Well, at least it had seemed like that until Dean walked in through the back door and almost crashed right into him in the dark.

"Who the hell is this?" Strong, stable hands gripped at his shoulders.

"Castiel." His name sounded slurred when he said it, leaning into the hands and Dean's personal space involuntarily.

He could hear Dean swallow hard for a moment, felt him shift his weight before he responded. "Cas, you okay?"

He nodded into Dean's neck and lifted his head, trying to get a good look into his green eyes while starting to laugh. "I drank too much."

"Yeah, I can tell."

The hands at his shoulders moved to his sides, which tickled a lot and made him squirm around for a few moments. "C'mon, I'll take you home, where's your car?"

"Wait," Castiel slightly pulled away from Dean's steady hold and slowly gained his balance, some voice in his head crying out against the idea that he normally wouldn't dare let himself even consider. Let it be known that being as drunk as he had been was an _experience_.

Castiel reached up with unsteady hands, cupping Dean's face in them as he inexpertly leaned forward to plant a kiss that was a little harder than he had intended. Then again, in sobriety, he wouldn't have intended to do this at all. Of course he had thought about it previously in a non-intoxicated state, remembered their first forced kisses, and the next not-so-forced ones, but those were behind them now, weren't they? He and Dean had talked this out, hadn't they?

"O-okay Cas, c'mon." Dean broke the kiss and had nimbly curled his arm around Castiel's waist, half-dragging him towards the front door and the car outside.

Castiel let himself be moved along like this, trying to be helpful and move his legs to walk for Dean, but they weren't really functioning as they ought to have in any normal situation, so he just let himself be hauled across the front lawn by Dean, his legs sort of dawdling along with the movement as best they could. He was probably going to have to thank Dean for this later. For the carrying, and the driving home and the party, and for everything, really.

"Where're your keys?" Dean's calm, soothing voice again.

"I don't know." He mumbled in complete honesty. He really didn't know. They were probably in his back pocket, but something told him Dean driving his car wouldn't be good. He wouldn't have a ride back to his house or something. He could hear Dean sigh audibly though, before there was some more annoying walking and then he was practically thrown into the passenger seat of a car.

He attempted to straighten himself out while Dean shut the door and moved around to the driver's seat. He wanted to regain his sobriety and fully-equipped thinking process was what he wanted to do, but since that wasn't an option, Castiel settled for fumbling with the seatbelt in the dark. It was a peculiar little thing that he could barely see; he could only see the metal of the seatbelt because he held it in his hand and it was cold and shiny and light bounced off of it from somewhere. The clasp however, was another story – he couldn't see it, and it was very smooth and kept slipping out of his hands when he tried to jam the shiny metal into the belt repeatedly and as fast as his drunken body would allow.

"Alright, don't hurt yourself," Dean soothed seemingly from out of nowhere, and his warm hands took their place over Castiel's and guided them so that he could finally buckle the seat belt. Castiel felt strangely accomplished.

"Thank you." He mumbled, looking up at Dean who was now studying the car with a key in his hands, probably trying to find the ignition.

They were off and moving within moments, and Castiel let himself rest against the safe, cushy seat. Had it always been this comfortable? He didn't think it had been, but then again, maybe the driver's seat wasn't like this seat. Maybe this seat was special. It probably was. Dean was special too. The seat and Dean had that in common – they were both very special. They both provided comfort in ways Castiel didn't expect, but in ways that he couldn't reject either. He couldn't really ignore the attraction he had to Dean anymore and he knew that way too well, the feeling of Dean's soft lips against his was hopefully a very permanent memory. The seat was pretty comfortable too, if Castiel was just going to be very honest here.

"Cas?"

He hummed in response, noticing that the car had stopped, though he was now staring very intently at Dean. His features were just fascinating. And pretty. Very, very pretty.

"We're here. You can get out now." Dean looked out the window for a moment before looking back at Castiel, jabbing a thumb towards the darkened front door of the home.

"Thank you, Dean."

Getting the seatbelt off was easier than putting it on, and for that, Castiel was grateful. He undid the belt and fumbled with the cold handle of the car door before opening it and stepping out, accidentally slamming it too hard. If he had been sober he might've paid more attention to the way Dean winced at the slam, and made a mental note to be more careful around his car for future reference, but he wasn't sober, so really, all of that wasn't accounted for. Hopefully he would remember tomorrow.

The air outside Dean's car was colder than he expected, and Castiel wrapped his arms around himself as he staggered up to the front door, hobbling up the steps before falling to his knees at the door mat on accident, but staying on the ground because he knew there was a house key underneath the mat. It must look funny, he thought to himself with a brief chuckle, Castiel on his knees trying desperately to get something out from underneath a welcome mat. It could also very well look strange, even pathetic, but funny was more preferable in this situation.


	10. Less Friend-y and More Gay

~ Chapter 10 ~

Dean felt uncomfortable driving Cas home.

It wasn't that he minded that Cas was drunk or anything, or the fact that Cas was totally shitfaced, but he was genuinely worried for the kid. Castiel wasn't the kind of guy to get drunk, really. He was the kind of guy to wear light button down-shirts in every color of the rainbow underneath a black blazer. He was the kind of guy that if he wore leather shoes, they would probably fucking sparkle, they would be so clean. He was the guy with the ridiculously blue eyes and fluffy dark hair. He was the guy with the full lips that quirked up in a sort of smile whenever Dean made an unbelievable horrible joke. He was the guy that probably spent his free time reading. He was the guy that was giving Dean butterflies 24/7 like some dorky, thirteen year-old girl with a _bad_ crush. He was the guy that was so incredibly everything Dean wasn't, and most definitely the guy that was driving him crazy.

But he was definitely not the guy that Dean had to drive home that night. As amused as he was to see Castiel unraveled and without inhibitions the way he was, it was that same looseness of every movement and every word that made Dean want to cringe away. It wasn't him. Cas was too good for that shit, wasn't he? Always drinking coffee from a travel mug and clutching his books to his chest because he was a good god damn student. He was better than getting drunk at a lame high school party.

He was so much better than the careless way he collapsed into Dean when they bumped into each other in the dark, and how the hell did he even get in the house? He probably only had to pee, but still. The guy was damn clever, even when he seemed drunk out of his mind. He was so much better than the way he slurred his words, his too simple, easy words that anyone could've used. Castiel was a higher education, wanting to travel the world and an expansive vocabulary, not drunk on cheap booze. He was so much better than all that, and hadn't Dean tried to warn him once? In the closet? And shit, if that didn't sound hilariously filthy, he didn't know what did. He'd told Castiel he wasn't a good guy, and Cas had reasserted his belief that he was and some other crap and now he was just giving Dean proof of that damn belief.

Dean almost wished Castiel hadn't fucking invaded his personal space that night and kissed him the way he did, with too much force for it to be anything chaste and forgettable, no thanks to his train of thought. But he was beginning to get to know himself better, or at least start to understand himself better, and he knew too well that that wasn't true.

What he understood was this: Cas was good and Dean didn't want to ruin that. He liked how genuinely innocent and interesting and smart the guy actually was, and the more he thought about better ways to phrase that sentence, the less friend-y it sounded and the more gay. Which really wasn't what he was going for, and still wasn't, really, but he was starting not to care as much.

/

"Cas, wait up!" Dean called after him, jogging to catch up.

He stopped and turned around, waiting patiently with an odd mix of emotions present on his face.

"Thanks."

He just nodded and they walked towards the parking lot together; Dean was mostly just glad that Monday was over and he was _finally_ getting his chance to talk to Cas today.

"How are you?" The question kind of startled Dean considering that he meant to ask the question first, seeing as he wasn't the totally hammered one last Friday.

"I'm, uh, I'm good. You?" He jammed his hands in his pockets.

"Better than I was on Friday, if that's what you've been concerned about." Castiel looked rather smug at his response, his blue eyes sparkling with unrestrained glee for a few moments before returning to their usual serenity.

"What, are you a mind reader now too?"

"That's impossible, Dean."

_Sigh_. "I know, man, it was a joke."

Cas shrugged. "I know."

Dean chewed his lip as they walked towards the parking lot. A quick scan showed that Cas' car was parked adjacent to Dean's today. Huh.

The walk continued in silence until Dean was at the driver's door of his car and Cas' was at the passenger of his, a short step behind him; he didn't know what to say. Cas didn't seem to either, or if he did, he didn't show it. He just put his hands in the pockets of his black blazer, _bless_ the fucking perfect thing, and looked at the ground, seeming to contemplate the dust and dirt on the asphalt very sincerely. Dean joined him in that, though he was favoring looking up at the darkening clouds overhead and enjoying the quieting sound of people leaving the school. He hated the vast majority of them, but then again, what was high school for if not mutually hating your peers who you coincidentally knew nothing about other than their first name?

Light, warm pressure on his hand shocked him back into reality, though it felt more like the dream he had last night – Cas was holding his hand gently, but he was leaning forward so quickly and so suddenly that Dean didn't have half a second to catch his breath before Cas' too soft lips were pressed into his, all warm and tasting like sugary coffee.

And just as soon as those lips had been against his, they were gone, and Cas was leaning against his car again, hands in his pockets and a faint blush on his cheeks. Shit, that wasn't fair _at all_.

"Hey," He heard himself murmur, and God, something must've possessed him to lean back towards Cas again, in the fucking school parking lot, and kiss him back. There was more force in that kiss than he intended, though it wasn't like he meant to have the kiss anyways. It was sort of like a reflex – when someone hugs you, you hug them back, it's natural, right?. Maybe the same thing went for kisses and Cas – if Cas kisses you, you have to kiss him back. God, _please_ let it be in some damn rulebook of the universe or _something_.

/

Castiel wasn't sure how it all happened, but all he fully understood was that it was happening and he was not against it at all. It was just as if Dean had stopped all of a sudden and in his characteristic way, went "fuck it".

He was completely aware of what was going on every time Anna would "accidentally" trip or push Castiel into Dean in the hallways or in a classroom because he would hear her little snicker of approval at the way Castiel would try to apologize for knocking into Dean for the millionth time this week. He found it strange at first, but then again, he couldn't control what Anna did and why she thought Dean was so great for him. But he wasn't going to try and fight it anymore.

It was getting to the point of being pretty fun, if he was going to be truly honest with himself.

He liked the pink blush on Dean's cheeks when they brushed shoulders in art class or when Anna sent Castiel sprawling at Dean's feet, the way Dean smiled when they first saw each other almost every morning, the gentle, teasing way Dean had with Castiel and how he couldn't prevent himself from having butterflies every time it happened or from hopefully anticipating it every other moment. He liked the giddy bounce this strange dance of affections with Dean gave him; it distracted him at times, but he was rather productive these days anyhow. Castiel's favorite part though, were the brief, chaste kisses they shared throughout the day.

The kisses would only happen when they were positive no one was looking, excluding those first ones in the parking lot that day – behind their easels in art, on their side of the tree at lunch, behind Castiel's locker door before or after school if the hallway was particularly empty. Neither of them sought the kisses out with an extreme amount of effort, but they were most certainly not unwelcome. They felt spontaneous – eyes meeting for a brief and fleeting moment before each kiss, quick and innocent. Castiel was more than satisfied with this, enjoying the increasingly familiar taste of Dean on his lips after every kiss and the ease in which they carried themselves around each other nowadays.

Though it did strike Castiel as odd, as he sat in Japanese one day, that they hadn't bothered to talk about what they had been doing for the past two weeks. It just seemed to Castiel that they were just enjoying the simplicity of the actions, the wordless sentiments and undying comforts as long as they could.

At least, it had seemed be so until 9:34 PM on a Thursday night when Dean texted Castiel, confirming their arrangement to hang out after school the following day. And even though he was only halfway done with an English essay and would normally have finished his work before responding to Dean's message, Castiel nearly broke his neck trying to get to his cell phone on his nightstand, eager to see if it was a message from Dean.

"_We still good for tomorrow?_" Dean's text read.

"_Of course_."

"_Cool ;)_ "

Castiel turned the phone sideways in his hand, observing the emoticon on the screen. It looked like a usual smiley face, but this one winked at him. Was that what Dean had meant to type?

"_Is that a winking face?_"

"_What?_"

"_The emoticon. Is it winking at me?_"

Dean didn't respond for a few minutes.

"_No_"

"_Okay._" He set the phone down.

/

They were at Dean's home, his living room to be precise, and sitting together on the couch. A TV show called _Dr. Sexy MD_ that Dean swore up and down the wall was a "quality television" played in the background, its volume turned down to the point of nearly being on mute while its watchers' interest was held elsewhere.

Castiel leaned against the arm of the couch, which was really more like a loveseat because it was too small to be considered an adequate couch, while Dean kept moving closer and closer to him, hardly breaking their frantic kisses to breathe. Dean's apparent solution to this problem was to work open Castiel's lips with his tongue, easing it past teeth and tickling at the tip of Castiel's until he joined in slowly. He was enjoying these kisses, he truly was, but he was confused nonetheless.

"Dean," Castiel breathed as Dean ventured into both new and old territory, kissing and nipping gently along Castiel's jaw like he had that one Friday night, though there was more precision and control in these actions.

"What?" Dean's response was of the same breathy nature, his pupils dilated wide as he pulled back.

"What are we doing?" Castiel asked the question in total sincerity, but Dean gawked for a moment before snapping out of it.

"We're baking pies, Cas, what do you think?" A smug smirk played at the corners of Dean's lips as he leaned in again, claiming Castiel's lips again with more force than before.

Castiel felt himself laugh into the kiss, because what kind of response was he expecting? Dean's lips curved up into a smile at that as he proceeded, lowering his hands as Castiel reached upwards, cupping Dean's face in his own.

Castiel's heart slammed in his chest with every touch Dean's curious hands made, though they never lingered lower than his waist, and he was thankful for that. Thankful and also completely entranced by how strangely good Dean's hot, flicking tongue and gentle, nibbling teeth felt against his lips, neck, collarbone. He wanted to return the favor too, tugging on Dean's shirt and sitting up straighter until he got the idea and allowed himself to be placed slightly beneath Castiel, who was more eager than he would've expected of himself to be as gracelessly nipped and licked all along Dean's neck, starting from his jaw, sinking his teeth a little more on a spot beneath his ear, eliciting the most captivating groan of approval from Dean. Castiel pulled back, barely concealing his look of sheer joy at the way Dean rested, his chest rising and falling with every breath, green eyes only half-open and dazed or sleepy looking.

"You're good at that." Dean cooed, grasping Castiel's shirt with one hand and pulling him in for another smiling kiss.


	11. An Awful Horror Flick

~ Chapter Eleven ~

Castiel had been sitting on the bleachers in front of the school's track, tying his shoes when Balthazar arrived and began doing the same thing. They both played lacrosse in the fall, and there was going to be a new coach next year who wanted to get a feeling for the potential athletes early on, so they would be more successful later – what that really meant was starting conditioning for the season two months in advance, much earlier than any of the athletes would've liked. Though so far there were only about five boys who had been consistently showing up to the runs and workouts: one freshman, two sophomores, Balthazar, and himself. Castiel didn't mind the inevitable silence that came with only having five people to work out with though; it was soothing in a way that he didn't care to explain.

But as it turned out this Friday, they were going on an off-campus run to the town's park and back. It was a fairly short run, and after stretching for a few minutes, Castiel and Balthazar were leading the other boys on the run, who were a good ten yards behind them at all times, following.

Castiel was focused on his breathing and movements of his arms and legs while he ran, trying to manage his energy as efficiently as possible.

"Cas?" Balthazar was giving him a cross look.

"Yes?"

"Are you going to the movies with everyone tonight?"

"I think so. Who else is going?" He had been planning on going with Dean, though he had other ideas of what movie they should see than what Jo had suggested. Jo wanted to see some comedy that just came out last week that starred her favorite actor, while Dean adamantly wanted to see some awful horror flick that had been out for months now. Castiel had been content to see either, really.

"Just the usual group – you, Anna, Inias, Jo, Dean." Balthazar blurted the words out, and his eyes kept shifting away from Castiel's gaze, like he was uncomfortable with the direction the conversation was taking.

"Are you alright, Balthazar?"

He nodded and mumbled an explanation about how he just thought about something he really had to do before the movie was all. Castiel said he understood and let the matter drop, falling back into the same silent ease of their run before the conversation.

"Hell no, Dean! That movie got horrible ratings." Jo and Dean were bickering now that everyone stood outside the movie theater over which movie either one of them would inevitably dragged into.

"Does it look like I give a shit? I want to see it!" They were both startlingly relentless and Castiel could only watched with quiet fascination with Balthazar and Inias who held the same indifferent standpoint on the whole thing while Anna stepped in and tried to pry them apart.

"Jesus H. Christ, you guys!" Anna snapped at both of them, shouldering her way between them and pushing Dean back by the shoulders. "You can each go see your own movies, everyone else will pick one."

She turned around when she said this, her tone final and commanding as she turned around, looking between the three undecided teenage boys. Balthazar and Inias took a step towards Jo and Anna for the comedy without looking up at anyone other than each other, but Castiel couldn't make himself move. Anna was just staring at him, waiting for him to do something, and Dean was giving him the most precious puppy dog eyes he'd ever seen in his life; he took a step towards Dean.

Anna grinned and clapped her hands together, "Great, we'll see you guys outside after for dinner or something."

It was a bit early, only 5:45 on a Friday night, and the lines to buy tickets were remarkably short for a solid five minutes before people started showing up in hoards behind them.

"Looks like we started a trend." Dean mused, shoving his ticket stub into the pocket of a green jacket. Castiel nodded at this, smiling too at how close they were while walking towards their theater, arms brushing with almost every step.

Upon entering the theater, he could see that it was mostly empty, except for a group of teenagers in the very front row and sparsely seated adults throughout the middle section of seats; Dean just grabbed Castiel's wrist and tugged him up the stairs towards the back corner of the theater.

The previews were just starting when they sat down, nearly in the same seat in attempt to sit as close together as humanly possible, feeling absolutely no shame whatsoever now that they were alone. Not that there was much shame anyways. Dean was skilled in the art of showing how he felt using his actions rather than words, Castiel had recently learned and now cherished every kiss and touch he made, because they spoke volumes about what was going on in Dean's head, so much more so than any number of words could.

Dean was doing that again tonight, tangling one hand in Castiel's hair and pulling him closer with the other, kissing his head occasionally, though only halfway through the movie. There was a mutually valiant effort on both parts to try and sit through the terrible film, but after a while the hilariously unrealistic splatters of blood and spill of guts, as well as the ridiculously shrill screams of the movie monster's victims became unbearable and boring – they tuned out.

Castiel grasped at the collar of Dean's jacket, tugging him closer while Dean pulled him by the hips, expertly tangling and untangling their tongues through fervent kisses – something Castiel was finding that he liked far more than he'd ever thought possible. There was just something wonderfully endearing about the touch he naturally craved and the way Dean just kept giving him what he wanted and the satisfaction of returning the favor. There was something about the slide of their lips and tongues, and the undying heat of it all that allayed any sense of right, wrong or reasonable doubt in his mind. It was all just _Dean_, and it was perfect. There was nothing wrong with this.

Castiel had been busy nibbling and sucking on one point on Dean's neck, tirelessly delighting at the poorly restrained whimpers it elicited from him.

"_Cas_," Dean huffed, grinding the heel of his hand into Castiel's groin, sending shooting tones of pleasure from his core. Dean pushed himself away for a moment, staring intently into Castiel's eyes, with enough focus that he might've been unraveling the mysteries of the universe in them, though the moment of concentrated gazing didn't last long and they were both on their feet in a second, Dean latching onto Castiel's wrist again and towing him out of the theater and down the hallway. He led them into a restroom at the end of the hall that was mostly unused, labeled as being for handicapped persons, but Dean didn't seem to be taking notice of that as he stepped in, flicked on the lights and shoved Castiel in.

The lock on the door clicked before Dean's wandering hands were at Castiel's sides once more, his hot breath and lips on the back of his neck. They were standing in front of the clean, single mirror, Castiel leaning back into Dean, watching through half-lidded eyes as Dean _worshipped_ him like this, all tongue, teeth and warm, prying hands. He turned his head, absolutely delighted when Dean quickly gave him the kisses he'd sought out, moaning into the taste.

Dean's hands lowered, pressed against groin again, making him groan into the kisses once more and his brain completely unable to keep up with his body while the hands fumbled with his belt buckle and zipper of his jeans. Something in his head was screaming again, but whether it was out of pure joy that he was finally experiencing something like this or of absolute horror at the oncoming point of no return, Castiel didn't know – he was suddenly hyperaware of the firm, pumping grip of Dean's hand on his erection and the unhindered ecstasy that he felt because of it, as well as completely unaware of how he could no longer be still while in this position, and the unrestricted gasps and moans coming from his throat.

Dean was growling an endless string of dirty things into his ear and Castiel couldn't get enough of it, couldn't get enough of _any_ of it. It was all so good, unrelentingly good, and Castiel couldn't help himself from moaning Dean's name over and over with each enthralling wave after wave of sweet, pure, _pleasure_, tumbling off the edge into release much faster than he'd expected.

/

Apparently Dean and Cas' movie was shorter than the one the rest of the group had seen, because the two undeclared lovebirds were sitting on a bench outside the theater talking and waiting, but not touching. Just sitting there. Anna wanted to groan at their utter lack of progress, but being that she was apparently alone in this irritation, she restrained herself. _Damn it_, would they _ever_ get past second base intentionally?

Anna spent dinner thinking about this and ignoring the funny looks Jo and Balthazar were giving her when she stared and squinted at the shrinking but widening space between Dean and Cas, who were really just acting more and more like a couple with each passing minute in her mind, though they really weren't, and they weren't touching at all. Not even brushes of hands or anything when someone reached for a napkin or something. Losers.

She chewed on her piece of pizza, contemplating whether she should just keep ruefully eating and send Castiel a flurry of pissed off text messages later, or just force their damn faces together or something – this total inaction between them was getting _ridiculous_.


	12. Liberating

**Author's Note: Awww, that last chapter was really fun, wasn't it? Well don't worry, we're going to be getting back to your regularly scheduled angst soon enough. –wink–**

~ Chapter Twelve ~

Dean liked to say that he wasn't very smart, but Castiel knew him better than that by mid-May.

Dean didn't like doing schoolwork, which is what he surely meant to say and though Castiel didn't find himself agreeing with that, he understood enough. But that didn't mean that he agreed at all whatsoever, to the idea that Dean was unintelligent. Dean could blow through any schoolwork given adequate conditions, time and assistance; he was showing this ability almost every day after school when he would come over to Castiel's home and start homework in peace that he claimed he couldn't find at his own house. Or rather, they would both start at the same time and then Dean would get bored and restless halfway through and start pacing around the room or looking for something he could tinker with.

Tinkering with and fixing things was something Dean was good at, and they both knew it. The first time he showed it off, it was unintentional. Castiel had pointed out that one of the wheels in his desk chair was no longer working properly and that it squealed when any pressure was applied to it. Dean instantaneously jumped at this task when it was presented, turning the chair over and observing the small, broken mechanism before asking where he could find a screwdriver and a pair of tweezers. There had been a screwdriver in a kitchen drawer and a pair of tweezers in the downstairs bathroom that they found after some careful searching, and Castiel hadn't even finished his short Japanese assignment by the time Dean had finished his little project and announced it fixed.

This was something Castiel wanted to remind Dean constantly while they studied together at lunch under the tree and in the library during study hall, though he couldn't. Dean would get relentlessly frustrated when he couldn't understand something after a few tries, eventually leading to him mumbling about how this was pointless and he wouldn't learn any of it in time for finals. It was these times especially where Castiel was especially _tired_ of not being able to doing anything yet stubbornly wanting to grab Dean's hands and squeeze them in his own, kiss away all the doubts and talk him down from the precariously dangerous edge of self-loathing he always seemed to drive himself back towards when Castiel wasn't looking. Though all these notions were at least a little ridiculous and he knew it, it didn't stop him from wanting Dean to believe that he was intelligent, but in a way that not many people would see and in the same manner that couldn't be tested. Mechanical things with gears, buttons and various instruments to fiddle with all made sense in Dean's head, no matter what the object. In fact, the more profoundly composite a device was, the more fun his friend would have trying to take it apart and then put it back together in a way that made it function even smoother. With all this knowledge ever-present in his mind, Castiel was becoming increasingly fed up with not being able to be open with their affections or name whatever the relationship between them was. He supposed this came from him wanting people to see how clever and worthwhile Dean truly was, since it seemed that no one gave him enough credit for the good things he did do. His parents were evidently always concerned with his younger brother, Sam, and only thought of Dean as the normal one, the amusing one, the one that they could depend on.

So in the occasional times when Dean would explain how his dad had clapped him on the back and told him he could always count on him, or how he had spent the night holed up in his room, listening to his parents have it out about what classes Sam would be taking and whatever random thing would be good for him. There were never these conversations about or for Dean, and Castiel supposed that that was the cause of his constant self-deprecation and Castiel's want to fix it and make it all okay. Dean wasn't a verbal sort of person so much as he was more capable of showing how he felt through physical means. Castiel could respect and enjoy that.

This was usually in the forefront of his mind, when he would be leaning into kiss Dean before school at their lockers, only to have to practically shove his head into his locker or pretend to look at something over Dean's shoulder to avoid someone seeing or suspecting anything. Or when they were sitting together at lunch, and though their little group of friends would probably support them, sharing a kiss with them nearby was unnerving. It was getting to a point that trying to have a moment in secret was more work than Castiel had ever wanted, and it grated at him in ways he couldn't quite explain, but it was understood clearly that he needed to talk to Dean about it.

So when they were sitting on his bed that Wednesday at 6:32PM, Castiel finally spoke.

"Does it bother you that we have to carry out this relationship in secret?"

Dean winced and shuffled a stack of papers in his hands, glancing over at Castiel once, then twice before chewing his lip for a moment. "Um, I guess you could say that."

Castiel brightened at this, sitting up and scooting closer to Dean. "Really?"

Dean blushed. "Well, yeah, but there's not really anything we can do about it."

Silence.

Castiel blinked, sitting beside Dean, thoroughly startled. "What do you mean there's nothing we can do? Haven't you ever thought about doing it?"

"Doing what?"

"You know," He leaned on Dean's shoulder, raising his eyebrows. "coming out."

Dean blushed even more, his green gaze flickering up to meet Castiel's for a brief and fleeting moment. "Have you?"

Castiel swallowed and looked back into Dean's eyes, looking for some teasing light or something that would indicate an oncoming joke, but saw nothing of the sort. "I have."

"And?"

"_And_," he spoke, eyes burning into Dean, "I think it would be liberating."

Dean scoffed and rolled his shoulder, shrugging Castiel off in the process. "_Liberating._"

"What's wrong with that?"

Dean shook his head, a hollow laugh rolling off his tongue. "Nothing, I guess. That's just not how I would've put it."

Castiel cocked his head at him, squinting his eyes a bit, wordlessly asking Dean to elaborate – Dean didn't get the message. "How would you have put it?"

Dean shrugged. "The opposite, I guess."

"Why?" The word was spat out unintentionally, giving his tone an inadvertent trace of malice.

Dean noticed. "Whaddya mean, 'why'? Isn't it obvious?" He paused, his eyes flickering between Castiel's for a few moments before he continued, his volume raising while he talked and the intensity just as much, "People like to talk, Cas. They like to talk and they like to judge and make up shit that isn't true about anyone they can't understand. I mean, I get that some people aren't like that, but in my experience, most of them are."

A certain sense of disembodiment overtook Castiel as he sat beside Dean, close enough to see the flush on his freckled cheeks and hear the erratic way he was breathing, but far enough that he felt getting closer could easily be explosive and dangerous. It was as if his soul was sitting outside the window, silently observing the tense exchange, wordlessly watching Dean wring his hands over and over and Castiel sit motionless beside him, staring at the floor, and neither of the two saying a single word.

The three of them stayed quiet for a short while – Dean, Castiel, and a disembodied-Castiel at the window – before the on-looking Castiel decided to return to his other half and speak. "I'm sorry I asked."

/

They didn't talk about that conversation the next day, or the day after. In fact, it seemed to Dean that they were just avoiding the issue entirely, which was totally fine by him. He wasn't interested in coming out to anyone really; his sexuality wasn't something people needed to know about or something he understood, and putting it out in the open would put it up for debate and he really just did not have the patience for that at this point in time. Before the whole dilemma at his last school in Mississippi, Dean easily would've told someone that he was straight. But now? _Well_, he would still tell someone he was straight, but he would probably feel at least a little conflicted about it.

But no one else was doing anything to make him think about the conversation except for himself really, seeing as Cas was being as quiet and pleasant as ever and his other friends were busy that week studying for finals and panicking over having to get a summer job or starting to write college applications. Dean was hoping to get his apps done later, in all honesty; school and college didn't feel like things he'd want to do at all after high school. He'd been thinking about moving out to California or New York or somewhere cool to find a garage to work at after he graduated. He was good at cars and mechanical things that most people found tedious and irritating. Cars were simple, there were right and wrong ways to handle a car, and they all made perfect sense to him. To Dean, people were way too complicated and emotional to understand and that was what he usually tried to avoid, hence his friends being usually very relaxed and down to earth kind of people.

These down to earth kinds of people especially did not include the pathetic crowd he had originally started hanging out with when he arrived at the new school – that pathetic crowd being mostly guys of the douche-y variety and slutty girls who loved to gossip. Though he didn't mean to offend douche-y guys and slutty girls who loved to gossip, it was just more and more plain to see as time went by that spending time with those sorts of people wasn't good for him. They were, as his parents and dorky brother might put it, _bad influences_ that could only corrupt someone or something good and worth preserving. Cas would agree with that sort of thing too. He'd called Dean good once.

"Dean, are you alright?" Cas asked, opening his locker. His brow was knit in that certain concerned way he liked to do when Dean got spacey.

"Yeah, I'm good." He leaned against his own closed locker, watching people go by and talking to one another in their excited, animated voices specially reserved for Friday afternoons. Everyone cleared out pretty quickly, one stop at a locker and then they were on their way towards the weekend, except for a few people here and there that looked pretty bored or lost. Poor suckers.

The hallway was almost totally quiet by the time Cas had finished packing up his things in that purposefully slow manner of his and Dean didn't feel a single ounce of shame or doubt or anything bad as Cas leaned in towards him, giving him a soft, chaste, and lingering kiss. Dean pressed back into it, smiling as he did so, forgetting his surroundings in the warmth that was his sort-of-but-not-really-boyfriend's presence and scent – it happened a lot more than Dean liked to admit.

Several titters of laughter startled him though, and he jerked away from Cas, stumbling backwards a bit. Whipping his head around, two familiar looking girls, both with long dark hair and fair skin stood at the end of the row of lockers, each with their own respective surprised but delighted faces; a smirk played at the lips of the shorter girl with curlier hair.

_Crap_.


	13. Under the Radar

**A/N: I promised you angst in the last chapter, didn't I? Well I hope you had fun with it! **

**Also, here is a brief lesson in how I'm conveying text messages and notes in this story, just to clarify:**

"_**text messages**_**"**

**(**_**notes**_**)**

~ Chapter Thirteen ~

Dean Winchester was notorious for hating Mondays with the passion of thousand fiery, exploding suns, but this one had to take the cake as the worst Monday in the history of the world.

It had started out as a normal day, his alarm clock was blaring away at 6:45AM and he continued to slam on it at seven-minute intervals until his mom came in and actually made him get up. He was grateful it was her this morning, because his dad wasn't nearly as nice about making sure he got out of bed in the morning. John Winchester liked to sleep too, all the Winchester men did, it was hereditary or something, but somehow getting out of bed was easier for him and he showed absolutely no mercy if you were oversleeping on a school day – a cup of ice cold water always got the Winchester boys out of bed and John prided himself in that.

Dean shuffled to the bathroom at 7:00 AM and stepped in the shower, stripping his clothes and leaving them in a hazardous trail on the bathroom floor as he went. The water was cold because Sam had gotten into the bathroom before him, so Dean was forced to wake up and speed up his cold shower. Damn Sammy and his need to shower in the scalding waters of Hell itself.

By the time he'd finished showering, getting dressed and grooming himself in the bathroom mirror, it was 7:33 and Sam was sitting at the kitchen table, finishing his usual breakfast of sugary cereal and tapping his foot impatiently at Dean. Dean just rolled his eyes and picked up the piece of toast off the plate Mary had left him and slathered it with jam.

Munching on his breakfast, Dean got his backpack together and slung it over one shoulder as he ambled towards Sam, already waiting at the front door for him.

"Careful, Sam," Dean teased, nudging his baby brother on the shoulder as he opened the front door, "people might think you actually _like_ school."

Sam rolled his eyes and climbed into the passenger seat of the Impala, resentfully hunkering down into the seat with his too-big backpack on his lap.

They drove to school in silence, Sam spending the ride staring out the window and ignoring the jerky, swerving way his older brother drove, and probably trying to focus on not getting sick before homeroom. Dean was absent-mindedly driving them along, unceremoniously getting them deeper and deeper into the traffic that surrounded the middle and high schools. School wasn't really what bothered him so much nowadays, it was the traffic and the dumbasses that encompassed, generated and thrived in or about the place in various different forms that pissed him off. _Especially_ the traffic.

"I'm studying with a friend after school today and their mom's going to give me a ride home, so you don't have to." Sam finally piped up as they pulled up to the designated drop-off corner by his school.

"Do Mom and Dad know that?"

"Yeah, I told them last night. I'm not stupid."

"I never said you were."

"But you were gonna."

Dean shrugged. "Probably."

Sam shot him a blue-ribbon award-winning bitch face that would put literally every sassy person on the planet to shame.

"Later, Sammy." Dean barked as Sam slammed the passenger door shut and marched down the street towards the middle school.

After that, Dean drove over to the high school, feeling a familiar sense of relief as he pulled into a spot beside Cas' silver car. As ugly as he thought the thing was, it was soothing to see every morning and know whom it belonged to. Though Cas wasn't physically in the car like he occasionally was when Dean arrived to school, he didn't let it get him down, he'd had a good weekend and hopefully a good feeling would be all he needed to carry him through Monday, the worst day of the week.

"Hello, Dean." It was Cas' voice – Dean smiled for a moment.

"Hey Cas." His locker opened with a loud clank as he said it, turning slightly to make eye contact with him as he shuffled through his backpack, leaving what he needed and shoving into the locker what he didn't. "What's up?"

Cas looked up. "The ceiling, I suppose."

"No, I mean–" Dean glanced up at Cas now, sort of startled to see the amused smirk on his friend's face. He grinned; he probably should've seen that one coming eventually. "Smart ass."

Cas flashed a wide, bright smile as Dean shut his locker and leaned against it. "How was your weekend, Dean?"

"It was great, actually. You?"

Cas just nodded, a solemn, almost saddened look passing over his features for a moment before he responded, "It was fine."

Dean raised an eyebrow at him for a moment before remembering that their relationship was more than friends and that he really should be trying to figure out what was wrong and how to fix it – he shifted his expression to a softer, hopefully more understanding one, internally kicking himself for treating Cas rudely. It just wasn't normal for Castiel Novak to have problems, or so it seemed to Dean. Cas had a fairly happy disposition once you got past the persistently stern and unmoving look on his face and got to know him. He liked nature and learning and being with people he cared about and he was intractably dedicated to his family, however absent they might be.

"Dean, are you alright? You look like you're about to be sick."

Well fuck. "Yeah, I'm good, sorry. What happened this weekend?"

Cas squinted his blue eyes at him before speaking, "I told you it was fine."

"And you said it like you just caught a whiff of dog crap. What happened?"

Cas sighed and shook his head, and was just looking back up at Dean again when the bell rang; Dean winced.

"I'll tell you later, okay?" Cas still had that pained, annoyed look on his face, but he sounded sincere enough; he nodded in agreement.

/

English was Castiel's first period class today and he arrived with minutes to spare, allowing him to unpack his binder and prepare himself for the class. His seat was in the front right corner of the class, closest to the door, but right in the line of view for every single person who walked in the door. And almost each person who walked in took advantage of the opportunity, some just glancing at him for a moment too long, some actually gawking at him, some glaring at him with an unreasonable amount of malice as they all walked by. What was going on?

The final bell rang and class began, which only helped distract Castiel from the whispering he suddenly heard all behind him. It sounded like it wasn't coming from directly behind him, more like several seats back and diagonal, though it seemed to be getting louder – his heart was pounding against his chest and he could feel a sheen of sweat soaking into his button-down white shirt at all this incessant whispering and snickering that slipped right under the radar of the teacher though the murmured words were pelting him gently over and over like warm, fat raindrops. He slouched forward in his seat, threading his fingers through the hair on the back of his head, willing his cheeks to stop burning and his heart to stop pounding away like this.

"Hey, Castiel?" a female's sweet, slow voice was suddenly and unexpectedly close. He turned his head slightly, willing the burn in his cheeks to fade as he did so – it was Meg Masters, a girl notorious at the school for being very charming and irresistible to almost every male with eyes. Though Castiel could easily agree that she was an attractive girl, with her long dark curls of hair, rich chocolaty brown eyes and smooth, unblemished pale skin, but he didn't feel drawn to her quite like most people would. And in addition to being infamously good-looking and sociable, it wouldn't be uncommon to assume that she was the start of a particular ugly rumor or two.

"Yes?" His voice squeaked on the way out. He cleared his throat; Meg gave him a strangely and subtly cruel grin.

"You okay?" She blinked her big, round eyes in a certain way that made Castiel want to curl up in a ball under his desk immediately and his stomach flip simultaneously.

"I am, thank you."

And thank God, the bell finally rang.

/

When Cas rushed into history fifth period that day, Dean couldn't help but feeling relieved and grateful about it. His day had been getting weirder and worse continuously and without any sign of halting as it went on, and by the frantic, harried look on Cas' face and the way his hair's kind of rumpled like he'd been running his hands through it over and over, his day had been doing the same thing. Dean moved his desk closer to Cas' like he always did once Cas was sitting and ready for class and exhaled some weird sigh that makes everyone within a three foot radius give them a weird look. Damn it.

Class starts and Dean makes as valiant an effort as he can to take some decent notes, but it had been painfully hard to do so when the topic of the day is economics. Seriously, who plans these lectures and what fiery realm of Hell did they crawl out of? However, while Cas seems to be pretty interested in what their teacher's saying, Dean wasn't and he was very, _very_ distracted – he pulled out an ratty, unused notebook from his backpack and opened it to blank page, accidentally making more noise in shuffling around his backpack and dropping his pencil and having to retrieve it, thus causing the entire row in front of him and then some to turn around and stare for a few moments before turning away, snickering. Fucking _typical_.

Exhaling a silent sigh of annoyance, Dean scribbled down a note onto the crummy notebook paper before sliding it over gently between his and Cas' desk.

(_Are people looking at us funny today or is it just me?_)

Cas eyed the notebook for a few moments, jotting down a few more notes before easily shifting his hand over to the notebook and responding with a certain quickness of hand that Dean was always impressed by.

(_It seems to be that way. Did you say anything to anyone lately?_)

Dean thought about that for a moment. No, he hadn't said anything to anyone outside their immediate circle of friends about him and Cas, but they wouldn't spread rumors or tell anyone else outside their little group. Hell, he'd only told Jo so far and made her promise not to tell anyone about it. Not that she would – Jo was a sincere, honest girl who wouldn't be caught dead with the likes of the scum of people who loved gossiping more than they loved their own mothers.

(_No. You?_)

Teach was glancing back at them every so often now, as if he was actually catching onto something for once. The poor guy was so old, but Dean humored him and went back to taking half-hearted notes, making an effort to look as ashamed and kicked-puppy-ish as possible.

(_No_.)

(_Then what the hell's going on today?_)

Cas was still taking down class notes when Dean shoved the notebook back towards him, silently demanding an answer for something neither boy was sure of, but Cas sighed anyways. He chewed his lip for a moment and glanced up at Dean with some weird, unreadable emotion in his eyes before writing in the notebook again.

(_I don't know either. But do you know Meg Masters?_)

Dean shot Cas his most confused look. (_Yeah?_)

(_And do you know her friend, Ruby?_)

(_Yeah?_)

(_Remember how they saw us kiss last Friday?_)

Dean gulped. (_Get to the point_)

(_I think_ ) That was all Cas was able to jot down before the teacher cleared his throat painfully loudly, making both Cas and Dean jump and look up at him.

"Would you boys like to share something with the class?" It was the teacher.

Cas was ghostly white in an instant and Dean's throat went dry. "No." He responded softly for the both of them, seeing as Cas was pretty much incapable of doing anything when he was faced with the prospect of being in trouble. Go figure.

"Then put away the notebook before I confiscate it."

Dean did as he was told and glanced up at Cas as he sat back up, slightly relieved to see the color starting to return to his cheeks, though he was still gripping one of the legs of his desk with a certain motionless fervor.

When the bell rang minutes later to let students out to lunch, Dean didn't mean to rush, but Cas was just apparently just desperate to get out – the guy practically broke his neck trying to race out of the classroom, titters of laughter and mumbling that following both him and Dean.


	14. Cuts and Bruises

**A/N: Hi guys! I'm sorry about not posting last week. I was out of town and I couldn't get any wifi and thus, couldn't post a new chapter. But here I am now, and I'm sorry about the irregularity! Hope you enjoy this! **

~ Chapter Fourteen ~

"_Cas, where r u guys?_"

Castiel showed Anna's text message to Dean with a light tap on his shoulder, who just shrugged and rested his head against the window of the car.

"_In my car._"

Anna was quick to respond. "_Why arent you sitting with everyone else?_"

"_Dean doesn't want to right now._"

A longer pause passed between messages – Castiel chewed his lip and stared out the window for at least the 47th time since they'd sat down in the car before glancing over at Dean again. His cheek was bruised and darkening into a painful-looking purple, and the rest of his face pink with splotches, a thin cut sliced over his cheekbone. It looked awful, and Dean probably felt even worse, considering that he didn't bother explaining what happened when Castiel gawked at the first sight of it. Dean just shook his head and asked if they could sit somewhere private. Castiel was loath to turn him down, but not knowing what had happened to his friend was eating at him more so than the increasing heat inside the car.

"_Well why not? We're perfectly delightful people, he should know that by now_"

"_Yes._" So that wasn't one of his most artful responses.

Nonetheless, Anna gave up after the last message and Castiel was thankful for the distraction to cease in its buzzing existence.

He swallowed hard and turned in his seat, drumming his fingers on his leg, contemplating offering to give Dean an early ride home first or making him explain what happened. "Dean?"

"I don't want to talk about it." His response was immediate and he didn't raise his eyes when he spoke, though Castiel couldn't even tell whether or not his eyes were even open from this angle.

"I can't help you if you don't talk to me."

"I don't want help." Dean mumbled, folding his arms across his chest and heavily leaning against the window and car door.

"Well you look like crap, and you need it."

Dean rolled his eyes and shot Castiel the most indignant look he'd ever seen in his life. "No need to sugarcoat it, Cas."

"I didn't."

Another resentful eye roll. "You're hopeless when it comes to social norms, I swear."

Castiel let the snide remark go and reached for Dean's hand. "Please tell me what happened."

Dean sighed as Castiel took his hand, staring back for a few moments before sighing again and tugging his hand away. "D'ya know Crowley?"

Castiel squinted at him. "The senior with the odd haircut?"

Dean nodded. "Yeah."

A pause.

"What about Crowley?"

"He said we were fags and that everyone knew it." The phrase came out as a growl as Dean curled up against the car door again.

Castiel cringed. Didn't they think that they could have avoided this at some point? Regardless of whether or not they had, they had been horribly and truly wrong, and somehow neither of them had believed it until a problem had arose and promptly punched Dean in the face. _Great_. "And then what?"

Dean glanced back at over at Castiel with some kind of strange smile in his eyes that died almost as soon as it had appeared. "Then I tried to hit him for it, but one of those goons that follows him around all the time got in the way and slugged me instead."

Dean was rubbing at his cheek while he said it, like the memory made the pain from punch resurface. Castiel reached out towards him again, this time letting his thumb brush Dean's cheekbone, to which Dean winced and hissed under his breath; Castiel pulled his shaking hand back, dismayed to see the blot of blood on the pad of his thumb.

He unlocked the glove box at Dean's knees, pulled out a handful of napkins and shut it once more. He folded one napkin and held it up to Dean's face, though he was still holding his own hand over the damage, protecting it, though finally he moved it and allowed Castiel to press the napkin into it.

"Thanks," Dean mumbled after a few moments of letting Castiel help him, though the cut was still bleeding, not profusely, but it was.

/

As it turned out, Cas dabbing at his cut made his face look not so horrible, though he knew he wasn't looking very attractive to anyone with eyes anymore. The cut still stung and his cheek hurt to touch and it was more noticeable than he'd thought, so Dean spent his remaining two classes in the back of the room when possible, with his head down where no one would even bother looking at him. It probably helped that his last two classes were two in which his friends weren't in – they would've asked, and Dean didn't have the energy nor the motivation to explain how he'd gotten his ass handed to him by some freaky kid's goon. But crap, how would he explain _that_ to his parents?

They would probably throw a fit, his mom would demand that they go talk to the principal or whichever person on campus was responsible for student safety, while his dad was likely to explode and tell Dean that he could defend himself better than this, and then Sam? Sam would just give him a puppy-eyed look that made him feel both ashamed and irrationally uncomfortable.

…So maybe avoiding his family for as long as possible would be good, right?

"Tell me again why you want to spend the night at my house?" Cas was unpacking his backpack at his locker after school, giving Dean an extremely cross look.

"I don't want my parents to see," he grimaced and pointedly gestured towards his face, "this."

Cas gave him a substantially dejected look and chewed his lip as he started situating the books he wanted in his backpack. "You know you can't hide from them forever."

"I know, but it looks bad right now and I figure it'll look better by tomorrow, right?"

Cas just shrugged, still having that concerned, unmoving expression painted across his face. "I suppose you're right."

"Is that a yes?" Dean put on his best, not-at-school-boyfriend-winning smile, hoping that it was on the side of cute and not creepy because of his purpling face.

"Yes."

He grinned and pulled out his cell phone as they walked to the parking lot, dialing his mom's number first – Dean was pretty sure she got off work early today, or had a day off or something along those lines.

She picked up on the second ring, her voice sounding like a wide smile and a warm hug that he would never admit to enjoying under no circumstances ever. "Hi Dean, what is it?"

The conversation was short and sweet – all he had to do was explain to his mom that he and Cas had a project to work on and that it would probably take a long time, so would she mind if he spent the night at his house. Mary said it was all right with her if it was okay with Cas' parents for a school night, to which Dean just assumed that they wouldn't be home as usual and told her that it was. Lying to his parents, especially his mom though, felt wrong, particularly since they had never really done anything of their own free will to harm him. The only detrimental thing that Dean could think of being related to his parents was the constant moving around throughout childhood, but he had long since come to terms with the fact that because John was in the military, it couldn't be helped.

Dean thought about this as he followed Cas' car, remembering how pissy he'd get as a kid when they'd eventually have to move from a place he'd finally gotten comfortable in. Up to the second grade it wasn't such a big deal, hell, they moved around at least once a year then, but after the fourth and fifth grade, making new friends was a tedious, painful process that kid-Dean would've loved to bypass given any and all chances. But even in the truly terrible places they had lived (see Florida, Minnesota and Mississippi), their living arrangements would occasionally overlap with the Harveles', and Dean would have someone to lean on during the first weeks at a new school. Jo was like a cousin to him really, if not the sister he never asked for, since what she lacked in height or ability to interact with others at times, she made up for in familiar, Winchester-ish spunk, and he could respect that. So much so, actually that he had a big fat crush on her when they were both nine and going to the same crappy school in Florida. He could only remember Florida as hot, uncomfortable and full of every kind of weirdo imaginable.

Cas finally parked in his driveway and Dean parked across and back half a block, just in case one or both of Cas' parents decided to make a surprise visit to their son while Dean was over – Dean was about 96% sure that Cas' mom still loathed him, and for that reason, he would not allow himself to be caught by her in that house ever again. One seething look of disgust from that icy-eyed woman was enough for his lifetime and the next, thank you very much.

Walking into the Novak house was always overwhelming – the smell of pine sol and fabric softener and furniture polish was just extremely powerful when in the same room, and though Cas never seemed to appreciate or be bothered by it, let alone notice it, Dean was incessantly amused by it. His homes never smelled so clean, never had and most likely never would, so the fact that Cas kept this house so damn spotless was kind of refreshing. He decided he liked it a little.

/

Dean had managed to focus on his homework for about two hours, and stay awake for two hours and fifteen minutes, as he was now snoring on the couch with a textbook in his lap. Castiel considered getting up from his seat at the dining room table and waking him, but also just letting him have a short nap; they both knew that he'd had a long day.

Deciding that he'd let Dean sleep for a little while, Castiel went back to work at trying to finish a hefty set of trigonometry problems. He found that he enjoyed the rhythm that accompanied this work, as it was about 45 problems all doing the exact same function with different numbers. And he was halfway done with it when his phone started violently buzzing in his pocket – Anna was calling him.

"Hello?"

"So what happened to you guys at lunch?"

Castiel sighed at Anna's apparent bypass of telephone manners and held the phone to his ear with his shoulder, resuming the listless math problems, "I told you already, Anna, we were in my car."

"I know _that_, dork, you said that Dean didn't want to sit with us. What gives?"

"Do we really have to have this conversation right now?"

"Yes, actually. My mom's not home for twenty more minutes and if she catches me procrastinating on my homework again today she'll take my phone away and I can't _deal_ with that right now, Cas."

"No Anna, I just meant that Dean's in the room with me right now and–"

"Then why don't you give him the phone, I'll hear it from him or you right now, I don't really care!"

"I can't do that."

"Why not?"

"He's taking a nap."

"Wait, is he in your bed?" She sounded genuinely amused as she said that, sounding vaguely as though she was holding her breath in her bizarre anticipation.

"No, he's on the couch." Castiel squinted at his math problems – what was there to be so amused about?  
"Alright, sorry, I can almost hear you trying to figure out my reaction, and it's not worth hurting yourself over, Cassie. Can you just tell me what the deal was today?"

Castiel gave in, resigning himself to try and explain what had happened to Dean without giving too many details, though that wasn't a difficult task, as he didn't have many details to give in the first place – Dean had barely told him any sort of detail or in depth explanation today, and Castiel planned to try and draw it out of him later. But Anna didn't even seem to be remotely surprised that Crowley was the one behind Dean's bruised face and cut cheekbone, but she did seem angry enough to do something, which worried Castiel – Anna wasn't the type of person to just watch something happen and pick up the pieces afterwards, like Castiel had so many times wished she were. Instead, she would be the type of person to get involved as soon as she possibly could, kicking, screaming, and fighting for the people she cared for and what she believed in no matter the possible consequences. She had a lot of character and motivation in her, to say the least.


	15. A Recurring Villain

A/N: Hello again! So I hope you've been enjoying the past few chapters, they've been fun to write.

~ Chapter Fifteen ~

"We can't just let this happen to them, Jo, they're our best friends." There was a certain edge of desperation in Anna's voice while she talked to her friend on the phone, itching for an opportunity to do something. That itch had been with her since she said goodbye to Castiel that evening before promptly calling Jo, the only one she knew who could help her help them. She didn't like the way that sounded – it made her seem far too meddlesome, and Anna Milton wasn't that. Well, not _really_. She just really had a soft spot for her friends like any normal person would, and unlike some spineless invertebrates of human beings that populated 75% of high school, she sought out to protect and care for anything she had a deep relationship with.

"I know, Anna, I know, but holy crap, are you sure you heard him right?" Jo sounded just as peeved.

Anna rolled her eyes. "Of course I heard it right – clear as day, I swear to God." At Jo's silence, she added "Let me clarify: Dean Winchester, your childhood _best friend_ Dean Winchester was attacked by one of Crowley's–"

"No, don't say it again!" Jo's panicking voice razed through the line, followed by her erratic breathing and rambling. "This is just kind of shocking, okay? I'm pretty sure Dean's never been hit back successfully by anyone in his life. He's all about that fucking last word and that's what usually gets him in trouble, and I think he's just been really damn lucky that he's as fast and strong as he is."

"Then we'll have to do something." Anna suggested rather bleakly, still processing the fact that Dean had liked to pick fights in the past. What did Castiel see in him, for crying out loud? What did anyone see in him?

"No shit, Sherlock. What _do_ we do?"

"I think we sh– _fuck_, my mom's home. Gotta go!"

_Click_.

/

Dean Winchester was an interesting person to many. But Castiel was now able to say that he'd experienced, firsthand, an entirely separate level of interesting that was Dean Winchester while he slept.

He complained when they went to bed "too early", and then once they were in bed, complained that it was too hot and could they just spread the fuck out? Then after what felt like ten minutes of laying curled up on his side, stretching the comforter out in a feeble attempt to give Dean the space he desired and also keep warm, he heard him indignantly mumble something like "_Damn it_, Cas, it's fucking freezing in here," followed by a persistent hand clutching his hip. So Castiel turned back over when the hand released its hold, dragging himself towards the center of the bed only to be helped by Dean, who pulled him into warm, open arms. Castiel fell asleep soon thereafter, comforted by the feeling of being able to comfort Dean, arms wrapped around each other in a way that dawned on Castiel as weird for his friend. Oh well.

He was woken in the middle of the night however by Dean struggling in his sleep, whimpering, practically crying unintelligible pleas for help. Castiel shook him awake, holding his clammy face in his hands when he finally came to, eyes wide and panic-stricken.

"_Cas_," Dean breathed out, seeming to remember where he was though he appeared no less shaken by his nightmare, his breath coming out in short, ragged breaths.

Wrapping two hands around Dean's neck, Castiel rubbed gentle circles into the clammy skin beneath his fingertips, hoping to physically soothe not only Dean, but himself too. It was an odd and rare occurrence to see Dean scared or out of his element in the slightest, so watching him from so short a distance, quivering and panting with fear or anxiety was unnerving to say the least. But he reacted well to the way Castiel massaged tender, calming circles into his neck, his breathing slowing down back to a normal pace in pieces at a time.

"Was it a nightmare?" Castiel finally allowed himself to ask, once Dean was visibly placated, relaxing into his embrace.

Dean nodded, glancing up at Castiel briefly, his green eyes still widened with that anxious, trembling fear, but also heavy with fatigue. "This happens sometimes." He confessed with a dejected sigh, seeming to melt into Castiel upon finishing the phrase.

"You'll be okay." He hadn't been able to think of anything else to say. What else _was _there to say? If Dean had been so easily mollified after such a seemingly lurid nightmare, it couldn't be that bad, right?

"I know." Castiel fell asleep soon after that, content for the time being that Dean, would, in fact, be okay for the night. He'd have to bring it up in the morning.

/

Let it be known that nearly pissing himself from a recurring nightmare was not at all how Dean had imagined the night at Cas' going. And in all honesty, he hadn't really imagined how the night would go, though he had been pretty sure beforehand that it wouldn't involve spooning until they fell asleep followed by the nightmare, _almost_ sobbing into Cas and then falling asleep again.

The nightmare itself though, was a weird one that he'd been getting ever since they'd moved from Mississippi to Illinois. It would always start out with Dean wandering the halls of some unidentified school with locked classroom doors and janitor's closets turned black holes that would suck him in if he got too close. It was like some badly created video game with no plot whatsoever, the only intent of the game-makers being to give the player as much fear and psychological trauma as they possibly could in a limited amount of time. And in his dream, Dean would be walking in silence that was only marred by the surreal pounding of his heartbeat that sounded both too quiet for it to be in his own body yet too loud, like it was being played on a speaker system for the _whole world_ to hear, and it wouldn't stop. Hell, it would get louder and quieter all at once, deafening him and also making him drown in the silence when the game's villain finally decided to show up.

The villain himself probably wasn't all that scary looking in reality, but in Dean's horrifying dream-realm? He might as well have been 70 feet tall, fire breathing, super-strong and in the possession of claws that oozed neon green, lethal acid for all Dean cared. It would really start with just hearing the villain though – his lisp-y, growling voice playing over the mental-speakers, except they were only loud, unlike the heartbeat, and explicitly so. He would be snarling and laughing out taunts, horrible come-ons and any other disgusting, vulgar thing he could possibly think of that would destroy Dean, so that he was a pathetic, whimpering, sobbing mess that was still intent on running as fast as he could away from him in record time. It was probably what made the game so fun for the villain, and what made him come out into Dean's line of sight in addition, just to obliterate every other function his brain possessed. It was right around here where the villain, whom Dean recognized as having the same face as the senior from his last school, who would either walk calmly, snickering at Dean who was suddenly very paralyzed to the spot, or break into a sprint, sometimes on two feet and sometimes on all fours, roaring with laughter as Dean tried to make himself run faster, faster, _faster_ – it would always be in vain though, because his legs would instantly feel like cement or jello mid-run and he would be able to practically feel the guy's hot breath on the back of his neck while he struggled or was attacked, pounced on from behind – but that was when Cas woke him up, right when his legs stopped working and he'd lost the game.

"Dean?" Cas' sleepy voice was close again this morning, accompanied by one hand on Dean's hip, gently shaking him, a soothing contrast to the nightmare's lasting effect on him.

Dean slowly blinked his eyes open, squinting up at Cas, who was sitting on his knees on the bed beside him, his hair tousled and wet, the only thing keeping him from complete nudity being a towel wrapped around his waist. Light from the bathroom behind him shone onto Cas' back, illuminating his lithe frame and giving him a glowing outline in the darkened room. Something in his brain helpfully supplied the word "angel", and Dean was hard pressed to disagree.

"It's time to get up."

Dean nodded and rolled onto his back, squirming about to sit up before swinging his sleep-leaden legs over the side of the bed. Luckily, Cas was right beside him when he started stumbling on unsteady feet with a capable, patient arm around his waist that led him slowly towards the bathroom.

Cas showed him how to use the various faucets and knobs on the shower, which way to turn one knob for hot water, which way to turn the other for cold, as well as indicating which was the shampoo, a tall ivy green bottle, and which was the conditioner if he wanted to use it, a smaller. little blue bottle right beside the shampoo. And before Cas left the room to let Dean shower, he placed a new bar of soap in the palm of his hand with a smile and a peck on the lips.

"Good morning, Dean."


	16. Minimal Trouble

**A/N: Something about this chapter has been unnecessarily difficult to write and it's really been annoying me, so hopefully I'll be able to get past it in a way that is enjoyable for all to read. Yeah? Cool.**

~ Chapter Sixteen ~

Dean had managed to get through the following Wednesday and Thursday that week with minimal trouble.

Minimal trouble meaning: being heckled by Anna and Jo at least twice a day about how he was doing, his mom wondering how her concealer had gotten into Sam and Dean's bathroom (Dean blamed Sam for that one – "I don't know, Mom, maybe he's experimenting."), a serious case of over-protectiveness from Cas, and roughly 2,000 gawks and stares from everyone in school. Dean could deal with Jo, Anna, and Cas being weird – they were close to him, at least Cas and Jo were anyways, but the fact that he couldn't be seen with Cas without the whispers starting or walk anywhere in school completely alone without being gaped and sneered at was pressing in on him in ways that made it hard to think and breathe.

But that Friday _truly_ had to take the cake for the worst day of Dean's life.

It was a normal day up to a certain point, really. Yelling at Sam to get out of the shower and to stop using all the hot water first thing in the morning, followed by a slow, sleep-inducing drive to school, sitting through his classes were people had decided it would be fun to talk about him immediately behind his back and then oh so cleverly stop talking when he stretched in his seat or got up to sharpen a pencil. At lunch he had rushed to his locker to stow some books and pick up new ones on his way to the oak tree, taking care to arrive at his locker once Cas was leaving his. He didn't mean to so blatantly avoid his friend like this, but Dean wasn't seeing what other better choice they had. His cut was half-healed at this point and it was thin enough that if he didn't let his mom look at him too long, she wouldn't notice – though she was starting to give him some funny looks whenever he turned his head away from her mid-sentence.

Later on, during seventh period, Dean was walking towards his locker, having realized fifteen minutes into class that he picked up the wrong binder from his locker after lunch. His teacher was nice enough to let him leave the classroom to get it too, seeing as all they were doing that day was reviewing for the upcoming final. And that lesson plan was the reasoning Dean used for strolling through the hallways so slowly that day, hands jammed in the pockets of his sweatshirt.

A female voice startled him, "Hey Winchester, where's your hall pass?"

Turning around, Dean saw that it was none other than Charlie Bradbury, the school's resident female sci-fi geek. She was wearing black jeans, cherry red doc martens, a weathered denim jacket, and a t-shirt displaying a vividly detailed unicorn with a rainbow main and bloody horn. And just to make her outfit a little more ironic, and blatantly strange looking, she also wore a gold pin on her jacket that bore the words "HALL MONITOR".

Dean sort of smirked at her, pulling his folded pass out of his back pocket and unfolding it before handing it to her.

She took it from him, looked at the front, the back, eyed it thoughtfully for a full seven seconds and handed it back to him. "You're good."

Dean mocked sighed with relief and pretended to wipe sweat from his brow, not really sure what he was trying to achieve through the actions, but she gave him a cross look for his trouble that he wasn't sure was worth his trouble until she spoke again. "Hey, are you and Novak a thing these days?"

_Fuck_. "Um," Dean stammered, his eyes widening and face surely going red as he quickly directed his attention down at the ground as if it the meaning of life was currently being inscribed into the dusty tile.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable there, I just heard that you were, and I thought it was cute."

"Excuse me?" He hadn't expected to have this conversation in the first place, and he _definitely_ hadn't expected her to say _that_.

"Wait, aren't you guys a thing?"

For once in his life, Dean was speechless and feeling unbelievably small, even though Charlie was at least four inches shorter than him. "It's complicated." He finally mumbled, shoving his hands back into his pockets, wondering how complicated what they actually had was. Dean liked Cas and Cas liked Dean. That wasn't that complicated, really, but the fact that they would have to come out one day – _shudder_ – was the complicating thing for him.

"Fair enough. As you were." Dean watched as she resumed her patrol, sort of bouncing along in those bright red boots down the hallway.

He replayed that conversation over and over in his mind as he went back to walking to his locker, equally stunned and relieved that not everyone in this school had a complete lack of manners and the mental capacity of a glass of orange juice.

What totally trashed that relief though, was the fact that upon reaching his locker, he was faced with a spray-painted mirage of homophobic slurs and taunts over his and Cas' neighboring lockers – Dean felt his jaw go slack as he stared at the sight in pained disbelief, willing this to be another shitty dream or an awful trick of the mind – but the seconds ticked by and nothing happened. Ugly slurs like 'faggot', 'homo' and 'twink' glared at him as he rushed forward to open the damn locker and go back to class before he had to look at it anymore. Halfway through the combination, a tidal wave of laughter surged towards him, engulfing him in white-hot embarrassment and shame that shoved him down, _drowned_ him in it; he dropped his hands from the lock and turned around, the back of his neck and face burning, his stomach twisting itself into painful knots, and his legs shaking uncontrollably.

"Whaddya think, Winchester?" Dean recognized that voice – it was Gordon Walker, some senior that he had in his science class who liked to blow spitballs at the people in front of him or just ditch the class altogether. Just his luck.

"I think you need to clean the damn lockers, Gordon." Dean snapped back, trying to stand his ground on shaky legs, arms crossed.

"Or what, Dean?" Gordon snapped back, glancing over his shoulder for a moment with a ridiculously wicked smirk at the small crowd of other wannabe thugs behind him. "What're you gonna do? Kiss me to death? I don't think your faggot-ass boyfriend would like that."

And that was the last fucking straw.

Dean lunged forward, stumbling but managing to keep himself upright as he swung at Gordon, his fist connecting with the guy's face with a gratifying smack. Gordon seemed too stunned at the retaliation to move for the moment, but when he finally realized what had happened to him, Dean could've sworn that he saw the guy's eyes turn red with fury, in a way that matched the red line of blood streaming down his cheek, before he threw his own punch, an uppercut straight to the jaw. The blow itself wasn't nearly as hard as Dean had ever been hit in his life, but the angle of it sent him sprawling backwards into his locker, his head slamming into the cold metal, the sudden cold sending a violent chill down his spine.

The guys surrounding Gordon were grumbling and booing and making all sorts of apish noises as their supposed leader cracked his knuckles and chuckled. Dean tried to take advantage of the fact that he wasn't being closely watched at the present moment to swing at Gordon again – the asshole fucking _deserved_ it – but the only thing his fist made contact with was the palm of Gordon's hand that captured his, grimy fingernails digging into Dean's knuckles before another hand gripped his wrist and _twisted_, making something in his arm to audibly snap and Dean to fall to his knees, clutching his arm to his chest.

What followed was blurred by pain and agonizing shame – he was on the ground, trying to hold himself together while hands and feet kicked and punched and pried and him, disassembling him with more power than he could have ever had alone. The blows came from everywhere at once and in quick succession, one hit after another after another. They weren't showing any signs of stopping, but Dean wasn't going to let himself show any pain; they wouldn't get that pathetic satisfaction out of him if he could help it – he remained quiet, not allowing himself to cry out in pain or to beg them to stop.

It was the words that they seemed to droningly chanting at him that hurt the most. All the words on the lockers and then some, plus taunts that Dean only heard halves of before they were garbled away by a new one trying to take its place, until they all finally gave up.

There were hands at his ankles that started dragging him down the hallway soon after and through reddened vision that hurt his head, he could see the fluorescent light bulbs on the ceiling pass overhead in their rows that were far too bright and made his head hurt even more than it did before. He groaned at the throbbing in his head, the only effort he could have made that would keep him from screaming or sobbing as they dragged him along to God-knows-where.

God-knows-where turned out to be some place uncomfortably warm and dark. Dean couldn't exactly tell where he was, but Gordon's voice growled something undoubtedly homophobic and menacing, he was sure of it, before a door slammed and Dean couldn't see anymore. Everything around him was pitch black, the ground was cold and felt damp to the touch in some places, his body ached all over and though his sub-conscious warned him that conking out right then could really fuck his brains up, he couldn't fight the way exhaustion and pain overcame all at once, taking over and pulling him to some make-believe, safe faraway place.


	17. Scarlet Geysers

**A/N: OH THE DRAMA! It continues. **

~ Chapter Seventeen ~

Castiel sighed as he sat inside his car, mentally running through the week, looking for reasons of any kind as to why Dean wasn't responding to his text messages. Dean was normally quick about responding to texts, considering that his cell phone was almost always in his pocket or in his hand, so either he'd fallen asleep in his seventh period and no one had bothered to wake him up when the bell rang, or he was in talking to someone. Yes, definitely one of those two options. Castiel didn't want to entertain the _thought_ that Dean might actually be avoiding him after school now too. School had let out an hour and a half ago and Castiel didn't want to have to leave without his friend if he didn't have to, or didn't know where he was.

He unlocked his phone again and looked at the sent messages folder:

"_Dean, are we still seeing a movie tonight?_"

"_Hello? Dean? Why aren't you responding to me?_"

"_I know you're still at school, your car is here. What's going on?_"

"_Dean?_"

"_Don't you have to pick up Sam from school?_"

"_Dean?_"

"_Dean, where ARE you?_"

Castiel felt bad about sending so many messages on account of his own loneliness, but he really felt that it was appropriate given the strange conditions at the time being, though he was beginning to consider driving home on his own and asking Dean what had happened to him later. But that was right when the phone rang.

"Dean, what the hell happened to you? Are you–" Castiel very nearly yelled into the phone, though he was able to restrain himself to an slim extent.

"Cas, shut up, I need help," Dean's words were slurred together and his voice sounded low and broken.

"Where are you?"

There was a rustling noise, followed by a wincing one and an exhale of breath from Dean, all of which were extremely audible over the line. "A janitor's closet." He sounded exhausted.

"Which one?"

"The one closest to our locker maybe, I don't fucking know," his voice was definitely broken now, coming out between hiccups and gasps for breath that were surely painful. "Cas, just hurry, _please_."

"I'm on my way." Castiel said into the phone before hanging up, jamming the device in his pocket and flinging himself out of the car, slamming its door behind him as he all but sprinted back to the campus.

/

Dean was only half-awake when there were hands on him and a voice nearby. He couldn't exactly tell whose voice it was, though it was on the deep side, so his heavy, bleary mind reasoned that it was a guy. Fair enough. The voice was saying things to him, though Dean could barely make out any of it, his ears were ringing and he couldn't open his eyes – they hurt too much. He just wanted to slip back into that hazy bliss of unconsciousness again where there were no dreams and no pain, but the hands at his shoulder and back combined with the voice that hovered over his skin like thin fog that wouldn't relent. God, couldn't they just let him go back to the painless sleep? Being awake hurt. It was sore, stinging and far too tender to the touch.

But they weren't letting him go – somewhere, a _very_ distant somewhere, Dean could hear his name being called and feel his shoulders being shaken. The overtones and the way the timbre of the voice sounded and felt familiar, much like the strength of the hands against him. That sense of familiarity made his confusion, curiosity and headache grow all at once, and though he could feel the cool rush of unconsciousness encroaching upon him, he managed to open his eyes.

He heard himself breathe a sort of sigh of relief at the blurry face above him, its edges illuminated in light again. Well, he thought it was again. There was a definite sense of déjà vu to the feeling, even if he was too tired and broken to place an exact memory to it.

Waking up this time was slower, more gradual, and if he wasn't in serious pain at any time in his life, _ever_, before this moment, he was now.

It felt like fire was razing through his veins and acid was being injected in the worst attempt ever made to extinguish it. Numbness from earlier was ruled out by the fire and the shrieks of pain that could have been external, internal, or both for all he knew. At this point, it all just _hurt_ and there wasn't much else to feel, no hope in the different forms of pain cancelling each other out. No, they were at war now, and they were _livid_.

Ache was catapulting boulders the size of mountains to and fro, the boulders shattering mid-air or against each other, sending obsidian daggers flying every which way. The daggers were faster than the boulders in their speed of flight, and were _arguably_ more intolerable – everything they touched reeled sharply away from the contact, though every time it proved to be a hopeless endeavor. The daggers wouldn't stop their brutal, vicious quest, and would plummet into any and all surfaces, causing scarlet geysers of blood to erupt from nowhere, spewing intolerable red in every direction possible only to die down in fervor within moments and resort to thick, choking gushes of blood that coated everything in crimson slime.

The next time he awoke felt different then the last. There wasn't nearly as much pain as there was before, so much as there was a new kind of numbness, a dull ache all over. There were hands this time too, cold ones, and they were holding one of his hands between them. Opening his eyes seemed like it would be quite the task, but Dean wanted to know whose hands were holding his; he could understand that it wasn't important information though, and that maybe he was dead and this was God or an angel holding his hand, guiding him up to heaven. That would explain the numb, cooling feeling wouldn't it? Pain probably didn't exist in Heaven and as they ascended, maybe it was just trickling out of him in liquid rainbows. Never mind, that would be weird.

But going up to heaven would mean that he was dead. He couldn't be dead. He just _couldn't_. Christ, there was no way he could be dead, he was only seventeen for crying out loud and there was a long list of things that he hadn't had the chance to do yet!

"Dean, relax," A voice soothed, accompanying the little circles that were being rubbed into his hand. It was different from the voice before; this voice was female and had warm, chiming overtones that were comfortably familiar.

"Go back to sleep" Were the last words he heard of that voice before a certain coolness swept over him, lulling him into a dreamless sleep.

"How is he?" A deep voice, definitely a man's, and _of course_, very familiar. But really, was that Dad?  
"He's still on the painkillers, but they say he's stable." It was the same warm, female voice from before – then it made sense. His parents were here. Okay, scratch heaven off the list of possible places he could be.

And what was that beeping sound? The only places you would ever hear that would be with a broken alarm clock or in a hospital. A _hospital_. Okay, so he was hooked up to a heart monitor then, right? Thoughts and memories were dense and fuzzy and hard to coordinate in this apparently drugged state, but something about having his parents in the room made this drowsy experience all the more shameful while still being very comforting.

"When's he going to wake up?" There was a third voice now too, which sounded unmistakably like Sam's. But damn, didn't hospitals have limits on how many people could be in a room at once? It seemed like something they would have.

Silence followed the third voice's question, and Dean could almost see this scene in his mind's eye: His mom sitting in a chair near the bed with wide, tired eyes, glancing over at him every few seconds only to see the same slow rise and fall of his chest while he laid there, helpless to say or do anything. And his dad, probably leaning against the doorframe with his arms folded or his hands in his pockets, one of the two, visibly trying his hardest to be the strongest in the room, at least for his family if not himself. Then there would be Sam, who, in this scenario, was probably curled up in a chair next to Mom, but would be on the bed with Dean, getting dirt on the white sheets from his shoes, and pleading with him to wake up once desperation started crowding in on him. He was such a good kid.

Dean wanted to wake up. He truly did at this point, being unconscious was getting weird, and if he was going to wake up from this drug-induced haze for anyone, it would be for Sammy.


	18. An Awakening and a Beginning

**A/N: If the last chapter felt weird to you, don't worry, it felt weird to me as well. You're not alone. This one should be better. I can feel it, you guys. **

**I'm also very sorry for the delayed update!**

~ Chapter Eighteen ~

Dean had been in bed and asleep all day on Sunday, according to the nurses that wandered in and out of his hospital room periodically, checking up on him, fixing the IV-drips, making note of something on one of the many monitors somehow attached to him, etc. They'd given up on asking if Castiel needed anything or wouldn't he rather wait at home, where he'd be more comfortable? The answer was always the most polite "no, thank you" he could offer, and they had gotten used to it, and would acknowledge him with a wave or a nod on their way in or out of the room. He returned said actions from where he sat underneath the window in a chair that looked like it was dragged in from the waiting room. It didn't match the other two in the room, but this one had more padding and therefore more comfort anyhow.

Anna, Jo, Balthazar and Inias came on Sunday as well; they were all about to enter the room together when a nurse stopped them and said that only three people could be visiting at a time. Jo didn't bother to ask whether or not it would be okay if she went in first, she just ran in, straight to Dean's side. Anna was the next person in, leaving Balthazar and Inias at the door, the two of them looking dejected and out of place in the hospital. Balthazar just waved to Castiel when they made eye contact, to which Castiel responded with a curt nod. He wasn't in the mood for talking.

Jo hovered over Dean and talked to him every now and then while Anna stood behind her and just watched with an interesting look of curiosity painted plainly across her face. Castiel joined Anna in her staring without realizing it, feeling a warm sense of relief wash over him at the sight of Dean asleep and peaceful now. The last time he'd seen Dean asleep was when he was trying to keep him awake, because for all Castiel knew, he could've had a concussion. Several years of first aide training told him never to let someone who might have gotten a concussion become unconscious – it could hurt him or her even more and the damage could be fatal. But he couldn't get Dean to come back to, so he called an ambulance and after what seemed like eons of holding his friend and trying to reduce the pressure on any spot that looked injured, medics finally ran into the school building, pushing a gurney.

But that was two days ago, and needless to say, the school's administrators weren't pleased to have an ambulance parked on school property, or to have blood in their hallways or to have to find Dean's attackers. Though Castiel couldn't really care about any of that – he just wanted Dean to _wake up_ already.

He'd been seemingly unconscious for the past two and a half days, with only a few blips of difference in the heart monitor that would indicate his body trying to wake up or do something other than remain in his quiet, unperturbed state. But Castiel hadn't wanted to leave Dean alone throughout all of this, so he'd only gone home the past two nights when they asked him to, and when he decided that he should probably go home to get his backpack to study for finals the following week or at least try to do so if he was going to be spending as much time as possible in the hospital.

So that was what Castiel was doing at 3:46 that afternoon: studying for his Japanese final in the same comfortable seat underneath the window. And that was right around when Dean's heart monitor stuttered from its slow pace and quickened, causing the blips to pierce the air even faster and louder.

Castiel dropped his notebook to the ground beside the chair, stumbling across the floor towards the bed, kneeling down beside it as Dean's eyes popped open and he gasped for breath, clutching the bedclothes.

Dean looked up at him through incredulous, confused eyes, his stunned features rigid as he laid there, his lips parted slightly and green eyes flickering back and forth between Castiel's blue. "Cas?"

He huffed a strange sort of sigh, something stuck between a laugh and what could have easily been a sob of relief as he picked up Dean's hand to hold in his own. "Yes, Dean."

"Where are we?"

"The hospital."

Another powerful look of disbelief. "Why?"

Now it was Castiel's turn to give the disbelieving look. "You don't remember?"

Dean sat in what seemed like thoughtful silence for several moments, his gaze fixed on the ceiling and his breathing still rugged and heavy with the effort. He had just turned his head towards Castiel again when a nurse came flying in, her eyes darting between the heart monitor and the teenagers at the hospital bed. She gave the two boys a puzzled look, but strode towards Dean anyways, fixed the various tubes connected to his arms, essentially went through her regular procedure once Castiel had let go of Dean's hand and returned to the chair.

"Your parents will be happy to know that you're awake, Dean." The nurse murmured as she finished up her procedure, smoothing down a corner of the bedspread before exiting the room once more, scribbling something down onto a clipboard as she walked, apparently too busy to offer any other kind of consolation. Castiel counted each one of her footsteps until she was finally gone before looking back at Dean, who was already staring at him with a certain intensity that rivaled the kind Castiel used more often than he liked to admit.

"How long has it been?" Dean asked in an uncharacteristically small voice.

"Since you've been here?"

"Since, uh, all this." He waved his casted wrist up in the air and visibly winced at the effort it took.

"It's been about three days."

Dean gawked and started coughing again, though trying unsuccessfully to turn himself onto his side. "Three _days_?"

"Dean, you're underestimating your injuries right now, lay back down." He was on his feet again, standing over Dean's bed, hands clasped gently around his friend's arms, urging him downward once more.

"Tell me what's going on and then I'll lay down." He demanded, squirming and struggling against Castiel's hold. And of course, leave it none other than Dean Winchester to purposefully ignore every bruised, battered and barely healing part in his body in order to make a point.

/

It was 10:30 at night and Castiel still wasn't home.

And his mother had a distinct feeling that it was that Dean Winchester's fault. He'd probably been soiling her son since the day they met, surely being the cause of his newfound lack of focus that could easily lead to trouble and school and an end to his academic success and –

_Breathe_, she told herself for the umpteenth time that night as she stood up from the couch and began pacing once more, fixing a painting on the wall that always seemed crooked and straightening and un-straightening the pillows on the couch, all in feeble attempts to distract her racing, panicking mind. But didn't she have a right to be upset and worried right now? Her only son wasn't home late on a Sunday night like he should have been. His backpack wasn't in his room and his bed was neatly made, but nothing in the entire house truly resembled his having been at home recently. He was always home. He was a good child at heart, she knew that, but goodness, he'd always been at least a little misguided or confused if not hopelessly lost. He had been like that since he had learned to walk and talk and listen. But he had been a relentlessly compassionate and empathetic child too, constantly trying to help as many people as he could, even people he wasn't supposed to help.

She remembered one day specifically, when Castiel was four years old and had been playing outside underneath the neighbor's maple tree. The child had disappeared from her sight for a few moments too many, only to emerge once more, running towards the porch where she had been sitting with something in his cupped hands. And as he ascended the two steps up to the porch, she was able to see the thing that he had been holding so gently was a crying, squirming baby bird with a small, dilapidated looking wing.

"I found him in the grass underneath the tree. I think he fell out of his nest and hurt himself."

"Then why did you pick it up?"

She remembered vividly the wide, childish, blue eyes that stared back at her when she asked that, and then the response she received. "I thought we could help him."

"Help him?" She'd scoffed, "Castiel, you _can't_ help this bird. When you touch it, you take away the scent its mother would need to recognize that it's her young and help it."

Now, she thought, nothing had changed. Castiel was still an unknowing, naïve child who just wanted to help something that very easily could have hurt or infected him. That Dean-character was like a little broken bird that sucked up all of a child's time, beckoning it towards him with cheeps for help or food or whatever other thing it could possibly want, the only way it would thank the child being pecks to the hand or the flu, yet never gaining anything from harming the boy. Little birds and boys like him were contagious. _Dean_ was contagious, and he had no right to harm her son in this way.

The front door unlocked with several clicks before swinging open and close. "Castiel, where on _earth_ have you been?"

He didn't make eye contact or move from where he stood in front of the door, only clenched and unclenched his fists a few times and adjusted the backpack on his shoulders, before giving her a tight-lipped smile. "The hospital."

"Why?" She barely heard his answer, yet more malice than intended slipped out in her tone, but honestly, this child _deserved_ the reprimanding voice.

"Dean was attacked on Friday at school, and he just woke up today. I wanted to see that he was safe when he woke up." He stared straight into her eyes, his own blue piercing and painful. "I hope that doesn't bother you." He crossed his arms, fists still clenched tightly, his tone just as condescending, if not worse than hers had been, and she was thoroughly done with this new attitude of his.

"Go to your room." She spoke loudly and clearly, making firm, unyielding eye contact with him, who only resumed his glaring for several more moments before turning on his heel and marching off towards the stairs.

She took a few steps towards him, glowering into his back as she spoke, "Don't think we're done here, Castiel. We're going to have a _long_ chat about this new attitude of yours later on with your father."


	19. Castiel's General Disposition

~ Chapter Nineteen ~

Maybe the pain medication was making him especially loopy and touchy-feely today, or maybe some of his brains got knocked out in the fight. Then again, there was always that possibility of Dean Winchester going absolutely bat-shit crazy. None of the options were all that favorable, but the result of whichever scenario it was happened to be him squirming in his bed to get up and hug Cas when he walked in. That was kind of weird.

Well, weird if you actually took the time to understand that Dean was almost always in control of his most unmanly impulses. Hugs were one of them. As was cuddling. Yet, awkward, loopy Dean only wanted to do that right now.

And luckily for him, Cas put up with it, though he made Dean lay back down again – so much for that thwarted plan.

"I take it you're feeling better today?" He sat down on the bed, letting himself rest against the pillow as he folded his hands in his lap. His motions looked like they were set in slow motion, like Cas only got a few hours of sleep in the past few nights, which was entirely plausible, considering he seemed to be at the hospital 24/7.

"I am, yeah. But how are you doin' lately?" Dean took extra care to make sure he'd put on his most sympathetic and caring and concerned face, though that face might've backfired exponentially because Cas gave him a cross look in return.

"I'm fine, why do you ask?"

Dean shrugged in what he hoped looked at least a little nonchalant. His limbs felt pretty distant right about now – he would have to ask the nurses if they could lower the pain meds, his body didn't handle them very well in consciousness. "You look tired, man, that's all."

"Oh," Cas finally sighed, and if that wasn't the most dejected little sound Dean had ever heard, then he didn't know what was. "I suppose I am, but that's normal."

Dean squinted into Cas' eyes as he tried to figure out what was going on with him. Cas wasn't like this. He didn't get so tired so easily, and he certainly didn't let himself behave like he was this exhausted even if he was. It was some bizarre principle of his, behaving properly and holding himself up as high as reasonably possible. So, all things considered, something must have happened, and that was Dean's splendid deduction of the day, thank you very much.

"Did something happen last night?"

Cas sighed again, and his lips quirked up in what looked like an off-handed, awkward smile. "I said was fine, Dean."

"Well you're not a very good actor. What's going on?"

He huffed through his nose, folded his arms across his chest, chewed his lip and glared out the window before finally responding, "Do you want the abbreviated or the full story?"

"Full story." He declared with a pound on the bed, "I don't think I'm allowed to go anywhere anytime soon."

So that was how Cas started telling what happened: he and his mom had some kind of short, but intense kind of falling out in which Cas defended Dean, followed by his mother deciding that she would be having none of that at all, and threatened a talk with his father. That wasn't hard to grasp, parents said stuff like that all the time, didn't they? Hell, Dean's mom did that sometimes too, when she was really and truly fed up with her boys. What was hard to grasp was that Cas' dad actually _came home_ to speak with him. Honestly, the man was hardly ever mentioned by anyone ever, let alone Castiel, so this was shocking enough.

"Wait, wait, hold up!" Dean put up his hands, halting Cas mid-story.

"What?"

"What does your dad look like?"

Cue signature head-tilt. "What difference does it make?"

"It helps me picture it better, what does your dad look like?"

Cas described his dad as "of average height" with blue eyes, dark, graying hair and fair skin before Dean nodded, urging him to continue. The three of them, Cas and both parents, had sat down in the living room where they had planned to talk. His mom stirred the pot by making very clear to all that she believed their son was misbehaving quite a lot nowadays, and he was bound to end up struggling in the following years of school if things didn't change soon. Cas rolled his eyes and grumbled the part where his mother's excuse for his "misbehaving" was Dean, but Dean himself didn't find himself that bothered by it – blame it on the meds. However, Cas visibly brightened up when he was about to get to the next part.

"And do you know what I told my mother after she said those things about you, Dean?"

"No, what?"

Cas grinned, a wide, toothy one that looked strange and out of place with his features and general disposition, but it was cute and endearing in its own, special little way. "I told her she was wrong."

And not only did Cas tell his mom that she was wrong, he went on, probably in that same fucking adorable giddy way to tell both his parents that he and Dean were in a very happy relationship, much to his mom's ever-growing distress and his dad's apparent contentment at the whole declaration. The scene that Cas described next seemed almost choreographed to Dean, borderline surreal enough that his mother's head didn't explode by that point in their family talk: Cas' dad just smiled and thanked him for the honesty and the confidence to share something like that with them, before standing up and escorting his wife out of the room, in her startled, disbelieving or otherwise confused and dumbfounded state of being.

But quite frankly, Dean didn't know what the appropriate thing to say would be, so he settled for the first things that stumbled out of his mouth. "Wow, Cas, uh… congratulations, I think."

Cas, at least, didn't notice or didn't react to his companion's awkward response. "Thank you, Dean."

God, he sounded sincerely pleased with himself too, and not in a cocky, overly zealous and annoying kind of way. There was just this genuine half-smile on his face as he looked down at his hands, folded in his lap. It reminded Dean of the enthusiasm that was in his features when he had first brought up coming out a while back, though much more contained and subdued now.

"Does it feel as great as you thought it would?"

"No," Cas shook his head, but looked up at Dean with warm, bright eyes before giving him a soft, chaste kiss, "but I like it anyways."

~ End Chapter ~

**A/N: Okay you guys, I hope you enjoyed this chapter and all the ones that came before it, because I've put a lot of thought and effort into this story, and I finally think I'm pleased with how it's turned out. **** However, I do have to let you all know that this is the final chapter of ****Bad Influence**** – and before you light your torches and bust down my door or anything rash like that (kidding, I promise), let me tell you why! In the past few weeks while writing for this story, I had been finding myself getting pretty burnt out and frustrated with the storyline of this fic and my not knowing where to take the story specifically, **_**sooo**_**, I decided it would be best to try and wrap it up. But of course I wasn't in the most ideal place to do so, what with uncompleted character arcs, plotlines, etc, so then I thought, "Hey self, why not write a sequel later on?" And that is what I will be doing in the future! I'll also be sure to post an update to let you know when you can start expecting the sequel to be posted or any sort of information about it. **

**In the meantime though, I have a large handful of ideas and AU's that I need to try to write for to see how they work out. I'm really excited to write those and for you guys to read them! -happy squealing-**

**Finally, I wanted to thank you guys for all the support of this fic. It's totally incredible and inspiring to see how many of you follow and seem to genuinely enjoy this story and I think all writers should be able to experience this at some point ****and wow I'm just bad with words aren't I.**** I hope reading this has been as fun for you as writing it has been for me – you guys are so wonderful and I think that's what makes this entire process worthwhile, thank you thank you thank you! 3 3 3 **


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